New York sugar settles firm on trade, speculative buying

Raw sugar futures finished near its session highs on Monday on trade and speculative buying as the sweetener rebounded from its fall late last week to near a 7-month low, dealers said. The New York Board of Trade's May raw sugar contract rose 0.10 cent to end at 8.18 cents a lb., dealing from 8.05 to 8.21 cents. July gained 0.08 to 8.30 cents. Back months increased 0.03 to 0.07 cent.
"There was trade support underneath the market and that allowed us to bounce. The locals then jumped in front of this thing as it went up," a brokerage house dealer said, adding May remains trapped in a band from 7.95 to 8.25 cents.
The trade is waiting for the process of rolling positions out of May and into the back contract to end by month's end to decide on the market's next move.
Some analysts feel a shortage in supplies and steady consumer buying should nudge prices up. But market bears feel the supply gap is not as severe and importers will not be booking as much sugar as initially thought.
Also, the Commitment of Traders' report showed funds now have a net short position of 16,183 lots as of April 12 from a net long in the previous week of 7,784 lots.
"If the funds decide to short this market, there's not enough buying to prop it up," a floor broker said. Sugar slipped to its lows for the day in business, but trade and then speculative buying enabled it to settle near the day's highs by the close of the session, dealers said.
On switches, open interest in May dropped 10,053 contracts to 54,059 lots as of April 15 while interest in July increased 8,182 to 174,520 contracts.
Technicians feel support in the May contract is at 8.00 and 7.95 cents.
Resistance was at 8.25 and 8.40 cents. Final estimated volume hit 59,123 lots, from the previous 69,357 lots.
Open interest in the No 11 sugar market rose 146 lots to 348,088 contracts as of April 15. Ethanol futures finished steady anew, with the April contract ending at 110 cents a gallon.
US domestic sugar futures ended mixed. July was flat at 21.15 cents a lb. and September was unchanged at 21.13 cents. The rest were up 0.01 cent to 0.04 cent lower.