London robusta coffee futures closed down on Thursday, with prices now well below nine-year highs touched earlier this week as investors favoured the New York market over London, dealers said. Cocoa ended higher, just shy of 1,000 pounds per tonne, while sugar held just below its seven-week high.
Coffee moved further away from the nine-year high it touched on Monday, when fears the Vietnamese crop would be late pushed it to $2,026 per tonne. Benchmark November closed at $1,916 per tonne, down $32 from Wednesday's close. Dealers said activity was dominated by selling London coffee to buy into the New York market.
"If you're not doing arbitrage, you're not doing anything. New York is up, London is down and that's where the action is," a London-based trader said.
December arabica in New York was up 1.65 cents at $1.3300 after trading in a range of $1.2925 to $1.3430, its highest for the spot month since March 2005. Finland's largest coffee roaster, Paulig, said in a Reuters interview it expected coffee prices to stay high even with good crops from Vietnam and Brazil.
Cocoa for delivery in December ended London trade at 999 pounds per tonne, up 18 pounds from Wednesday's close. "There's been buying from the discretionary funds since it found support at 935, and currency moves have helped it today," a dealer said.
A firmer British pound versus the broadly ailing dollar was a supportive factor, dealers said. Sterling was last up 0.4 percent on the day at $2.0089. "Currency moves are helping New York push on, and that's pulling London higher too," the dealer said. Ivorian cocoa arrivals at San Pedro port were 506,505 tonnes by September 16, according to data from the Coffee and Cocoa Bourse. White sugar futures in London ended higher, although the market remained below seven-week peaks touched on Wednesday.
The December contract ended trading at $288.00 per tonne, down from the previous session's front-month peak of $301.30 but up $2.70 from Wednesday's settlement price. "There is some fund buying in New York and that's caused some short-covering in London, which is dragging London up, but apart from that it's gone to sleep," a London dealer said.
Russia, the world's largest buyer of raw sugar, will soon adopt a higher seasonal import duty acting Economy Minister German Gref said, news which helped support raws prices in New York, dealers said. The Reuters/Jeffries CRB Index of commodities futures hit a fresh 12-1/2 month high of 332.95, up from Wednesday's peak of 329.62.
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