Tokyo rubber futures rose on Tuesday on short-covering and position-squaring ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday, when some traders in Asia will be off.
The benchmark June 2004 rubber contract on the Tokyo Commodity Exchange settled up 3.3 yen per kg at 144.7 yen. Other months rose by 1.8 yen to 3.3 yen.
"Traders don't want to go into a holiday with their positions uncovered," a Tokyo broker said. He said short covering by some Asian traders such as those in Singapore had helped boost the market.
Open interest stood at 60,618 lots as of the end of Monday, versus 60,493 lots on Friday and 61,451 lots on Thursday.