Rough rice futures at the Chicago Board of Trade closed mostly steady to firm on Tuesday after a lightly traded session, traders said. A void of news kept prices within a tight range. September was unchanged at $9.43 and new-crop November was up 4 cents at $9.66.
Thinly traded July, which expires on Thursday, closed 4 cents lower at $9.26 per hundredweight. Open interest fell to 57 contracts as of Tuesday's start.
Light speculative selling by scattered commission houses weighed on prices early. Later, ADM Investor Services bought 15 or 20 November, likely for a commodity fund, traders said.
"Volume was so light today, that could have been the biggest trade," one rice trader said. An estimated 175 futures and 96 options traded. That was down from 212 futures traded on Monday, another slow day.
US cash markets were quiet with demand remaining weak due to high prices, traders said. USDA late Monday said 55 percent of the US rice crop was in good to excellent condition, unchanged from the prior week.
USDA also reported late Tuesday that it raised the weekly world market price for long grain rough rice by 17 cents to $6.77 per cwt. There were 12 July rice deliveries on Tuesday morning. A customer of Man Financial issued them and they were stopped by an ADM customer.