White sugar closed off 2-1/2 month peaks on speculative short covering on Tuesday, while cocoa settled off 4-1/2-month highs with a strike in top producer Ivory Coast providing background support, dealers said. London robusta coffee futures closed little changed after a choppy session underpinned by industry buying.
In white sugar, March settled up $4.40 to $299.40 per tonne, after breaking through key psychological resistance of $300.00 late in the session to a 2-1/2-month peak of $300.50. Fund manager Principle Capital has raised $70 million towards a $290 million Mozambique bioethanol plant expected to come onstream in 2011, CEO Brian Myerson said on Tuesday.
Relations between Australia's billion dollar sugar export industry and big producer India are rapidly souring in a dispute over Indian export subsidies which are flooding world markets, hitting prices and profitability.
Royal Dutch Shell Plc is to fund a project that aims to produce transport fuel from algae, as biofuel production from palm oil and crops are increasingly criticised for causing deforestation and higher food prices.
London cocoa futures closed little changed, off fresh 4-1/2-month highs after a session dominated by rollover business. March finished down 4 pounds to 1,046 pounds per tonne in heavy volume of 23,980 lots, after earlier touching a 4-1/2-month peak of 1,060 pounds.
Much of the volume was rollover business before expiry of the December contract on Wednesday. A strike by labourers at cocoa warehouses in top world producer Ivory Coast, which entered its second day on Tuesday, provided background support.
Exporters estimated there were between 10,000 and 15,000 tonnes of cocoa stacked on lorries parked outside their warehouses at Abidjan's port. Cocoa purchases declared by private buyers to Ghana's Cocobod industry regulator reached 294,596 tonnes between October 19 and November 22, an industry source said on Tuesday.
London robusta coffee futures closed little changed after a choppy session underpinned by industry buying, although dealers said producer selling pressure from top robusta producer Vietnam was subdued.
March settled up $6 at $1,859 per tonne in moderate volume of 6,713 lots. Coffee prices in Vietnam rebounded more than 4 percent in the past week, supported by a strong recovery in London robusta futures and an expected decline in output, traders said on Tuesday.
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