US cocoa futures slid to a two-week low on Friday, depressed by speculative selling and profit-taking on the day of first notice for September delivery, market sources said.
New York Board of Trade's benchmark cocoa contract for December delivery shed $28 to settle at $1,545 a tonne, the weakest since August 2, after trading from $1,533 to $1,562. Back month cocoa futures retreated $23 to $27, while spot September fell $19 to conclude at $1,481 a tonne.
"There was a good amount of spec selling today. We figure the specs sold about 1,500 to 2,000 lots today," a cocoa trader said, estimating final futures trading volume at 11,802 contracts.
"There was a little bit of volume traded in September-December (spread), but the real volume swung into December-March," he said. Traders also cited light speculative profit taking before the weekend. Technically, a trader put key support in NYBOT December cocoa at $1,526 with resistance at $1,584.
NYBOT data showed 96 delivery notices for the September contract, with beans originating from Indonesia and Malaysia. In London trading, Life's December cocoa contract eased 3 pounds at 877 pounds a tonne. A weak pound versus the US currency spurred arbitrage-related selling in New York.
Sterling fell as far as $1.8781 against the greenback as investors scaled back bets on higher UK interest rates. Bean deliveries from top cocoa producer Ivory Coast's 2005/06 crop, which started in October, have been slow arriving to the ports due to recent heavy rains. Industry data in top cocoa producer Ivory Coast showed there were 3,947 tonnes of beans delivered to ports in the West African country between August 7 and 13.
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