Arabica futures prices were seen holding between $1.80 and $2 a pound through September, the president of Illycaffe, Andrea Illy, said at an event in Sao Paulo on Thursday. He said Brazil's 2012/13 coffee crop is seen at 55 million 60-kg bags, unchanged from a previous estimate of the new crop by the big European roaster, which gave no year-earlier estimate for comparison.
Last season's off-year crop in Brazil put out 43.15 million bags, according to the Agriculture Ministry. The coffee belt is in an on-year, in which trees' output surges in between years when trees recover.