Cocoa futures ended mostly lower on Monday, pressured by a rise in the US dollar even as smaller-than-expected notices for July delivery added support. "London finished up and we had to adjust lower to compensate for the rising dollar," said a trader, referring to arbitrage.
"You also had what appeared to be fund selling on the day and a bit of trade scale-up selling as well." The New York Board of Trade's active cocoa contract for September delivery settled down $6 at $1,533 a tonne. Travelling from trades at $1,548 to $1,525, it remained inside the trading range from Friday, when the newly active contract reached its loftiest price since May 19.
Some trade houses appeared to have come into the open still long from Friday. The July contract, for which delivery notices started on Monday, rose $2 to end at $1,527, with tenders coming in on the small side.
Back months went down $5-$6. The trader said the price to beat on the upside on Friday's high at $1,555. Support at $1,515 was just below the previous low at $1,516. "If we hold that, we're still technically very positive." On Monday's cocoa news mainly supported a picture of decent supply, which can help cap prices.
Major exporters in top cocoa grower Ivory Coast estimated on Monday's survey that cocoa arrivals at Ivories ports reached 1.230 million tonnes between October 1 and June 18, up from 1.216 million tonnes delivered to ports in the same period last year.
Still, cocoa production in eastern Ivory Coast has been poor during this April-September mid-crop season due to lack of rainfall and chemical treatment, farmers and buyers said on Monday. The region is renowned for producing some of the highest quality cocoa, but this year growers are disappointed with output, which they expect will finish much lower than the historic average of 230,000 tonnes.