SHANGHAI: Japanese rubber futures fell on Thursday, as a slump in Tokyo equities, weaker Chinese rubber imports, and profit-taking after a recent rally weighed on sentiment.
The Osaka Exchange (OSE) rubber contract for March delivery was down 6.8 yen, or 1.5 percent, at 446.6 yen (USD2.83) per kg. The rubber contract on the Shanghai Futures Exchange (SHFE) for January delivery slumped 480 yuan, or 2.37 percent, to 19,735 yuan (USD2,948.56) per metric ton.
The most active November butadiene rubber contract on the SHFE fell 305 yuan, or 1.89 percent, to 15,795 yuan per metric ton. Rubber prices may be tracking broader risk sentiment and profit-taking following a recent run-up, a Singapore-based trader said.
With prices now near support levels, short positions could face a squeeze given the continued tightness in raw material supply, the trader said.
Japan’s Nikkei share average tumbled nearly 5 percent on Thursday, with tech stocks hit hard by media reports about distressed debt at US cloud-computing provider CoreWeave, while hot US inflation figures sparked fears of higher interest rates.
China imported 588,000 tons of natural and synthetic rubber in September, down 20.8 percent from 742,000 tons a year earlier, the General Administration of Customs of China said on Wednesday.
Imports totalled 5.68 million tons in the first nine months of the year, down 7.1 percent from 6.11 million tons in the same period last year.
The front-month rubber contract on Singapore Exchange’s SICOM platform for January delivery last traded at 248.8 US cents per kg, down 2.3 percent as of 0700 GMT.
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