Cocoa futures rose for the third straight session Tuesday, with prices creeping close to the top end of a trading range that has held for more than a week on a dearth of fundamental news, traders said.
On the New York Board of Trade, the most-active December cocoa contract rose $18 to settle at $1,492 a tonne, just $2 shy of the top end of the day's $1,466-$1,494 range.
The December contract has been stuck in a trading range of $1,442 to $1,498 for more than a week.
March 2005 climbed $16 to $1,509, while longer-dated cocoa futures moved up $16 to $17. "We are seeing some retracement here. The market bottomed out at the $1,440 level, and now we are going through a consolidation, correction phase," one trader said.