Rough rice futures on the Chicago Board of Trade ended higher on Monday, rebounding from a weak start with both moves driven by speculative interests amid little news, traders said. "We were on the defensive from speculative selling in the November. When we couldn't generate any additional sales we came back on light spec buying," one rice trader said.
July rice ended 9 cents higher at $10.81 per hundredweight, up considerably from its low of $10.61. The back months ended 8 to 9-1/2 cents higher. Volume was estimated at 1,746 futures and 107 options, up from the 1,445 futures and 65 options that traded on Friday. A good portion of the volume was made in spreads as commodity funds rolled their July positions into the September contract, traders said.
The July-September spread traded at 37 to 37-1/2 cents. After the close the US Agriculture Department said that the condition of the rice crop deteriorated slightly in the past week, down 2 points with 74 percent rated good to excellent.
But that was up considerably from a year ago when only 56 percent of the rice crop was rated well to excellent. In world news, Indonesia expects to increase its production of unmilled rice by 5 percent to 61.1 million tonnes in 2008, the agriculture minister said on Monday.