LONDON: New York cocoa futures on ICE were hovering just below the previous session’s 12-year peak on Wednesday, with crop concerns partially offset by signs the recent run-up in prices could curb demand.

COCOA: September New York cocoa fell 0.1% to $3,404 a metric ton by 1324 GMT, consolidating just below Tuesday’s 12-year peak of $3,429.

The recent rise in prices has been driven by crop concerns in the key West African-producing region where wet weather has led to outbreaks of the black pod disease.

The International Cocoa Organization, in a report issued on Wednesday, said heavy rains in top grower Ivory Coast could reduce cocoa production “during the latter part of the 2022/23 mid-crop, and even further extend the detrimental effects to the main crop of the 2023/24 season”.

High prices appear, however, to be beginning to lower demand, with last week’s European second-quarter cocoa grind down 5.7% year on year.

Dealers said North American second-quarter grind data due on Thursday should provide a short-term focus.

September London cocoa rose 0.75% to 2,551 pounds per metric ton.

A crackdown by Cameroon on the sale of cocoa beans to unlicensed buyers from Nigeria has left farmers in two border regions with tons of beans piling up in warehouses ahead of the start of the main harvest in October, a producers’ union and farmers told Reuters.