Tokyo rubber futures rose modestly in thin trade on Friday, supported by the yen's sharp fall after surprisingly weak Japanese growth data, but rubber faced stiff technical resistance amid a dearth of strong buying factors.
Expectations for more physical supplies continued to undermine sentiment. The market has been under technical downward pressure since falling from a five-week high of 145.7 yen per kg hit in the week, traders said.
"Technically, the market is seeing pretty stiff resistance around 145 yen and it seems ample physical supplies are making traders reluctant to build up new positions," said an analyst at a Japanese commodities brokerage.
The benchmark January contract on the Tokyo Commodity Exchange (TOCOM) closed 0.3 yen per kg higher at 142.7 yen. Other contracts closed unchanged to up 0.5 yen. Activity was thin with market players away for Japan's traditional "o-bon" holidays, which continue through next week.
The volume of TOCOM rubber was estimated at thin 3,854 contracts compared with Thursday's 3,975 lots. "The yen's weakness helped provide support, but rubber was vulnerable to more long liquidations as traders appeared to be more willing to slash their positions," the analyst said.
The yen fell over 1 percent against the dollar and hit a three-month low versus the euro on Friday after unexpectedly soft growth data cast doubt over the health of Japan's economy.
Government data showed the economy grew 0.4 percent in April-June from the previous quarter.
That was well below a median forecast of 1.0- percent growth in a Reuters poll. The dollar rose as high as 112.02 yen in Asia, sharply up from around 110.80 in late New York trade.
Open interest rose slightly to 35,005 contracts as of the end of Thursday compared with 34,969 on Wednesday.