New York sugar lower

NYBOT raw sugar futures closed quietly softer on Wednesday on sales by small speculators, with the sweetener seen staying in its current range given the dearth of market-moving news, brokers said.
March sugar fell 0.09 cent to finish at 8.76 cents a lb, pinned between 8.75 and 8.85 cents. It was an inside day since the range was within on Tuesday's 8.70 to 8.88 cents band. On Monday, the March contract closed at 8.73 cents in the worst close for sugar on a spot basis since ending at 8.39 cents on September 29, 2004.
May lose 0.06 cent to 8.90 cents. Distant months were down 0.05 or 0.06 cent. "It's just going nowhere at this point. It's such a small range and I don't think we're going to get any fireworks this week," a dealer for a major brokerage house said.
Over the long haul, market fundamentals are seen as bullish due to a supply deficit in the 2004/05 season. At the start, trade accounts enabled the market to open steady but that soon petered out, dealers said.
"It came right back down on locals. We will need the funds to come in hard if we want to get past the area around 8.85 (cents, basis March) cents," one explained.
Technicians believe support in the March contract would be at 8.71 and then the region of 8.55/58 cents. Resistance would be at 8.90 cents, followed by the area between 9.09 and 9.14 cents.
The estimated volume before the market closed for the day hit about 11,357 lots, from 26,119 lots previously. Call volume at that time hit about 3,797 lots while puts stood at 3,597 lots.
Open interest in the No 11 raw sugar market rose 17 lots to 332,020 lots as of October 26. Ethanol futures closed steady with the November contract finishing flat at 145 cents a gallon.
US domestic sugar prices settled higher on Wednesday.
January sugar went up 0.03 cent to 20.48 cents a lb and March rose 0.02 to 20.47 cents. Except for one contract, the rest were flat to 0.02 cent better. Traded volume just before the market concluded business hit some 756 lots, from 1,206 lots previously.