US arabica coffee finished mostly lower on Monday, with July/September position-rolling continuing to dominate trading ahead of the front-month's June 21 first notice day, while origin sellers sat on the sidelines, traders said.
"We saw a very strong volatility on the July/September spread, straight out to 1.45 (cents). It came all the way from 2.55 so it's a very strong move," one dealer said.
NYBOT open-outcry July coffee closed up 0.50 cent at $1.1520 per lb after trading $1.1440 to $1.1670. Benchmark September inched down 0.15 cent to $1.1705 and dealt from $1.1680 to $1.1880.
The rest retreated 0.10 to 0.25 cent. On the IntercontinentalExchange New York Board of Trade (NYBoT) electronic platform at 1:35 pm EDT (1735 GMT), September coffee was 0.60 cent lower at $1.1660 a lb. The funds were short July so were forced to buy the spot month and sell September, one broker explained.
"So a lot of the speculators were thinking that their spread would not get any tighter than this, but they were also short on this and I think they were cut on that, and everybody had to run through the same door and that's why the spread got as strong as it did," the broker said.
In London, robusta coffee futures ended little changed, with Life's September contract $1 firmer at $1,876 per tonne after trading from $1,865 to $1,887. NYBOT estimated 5,891 lots traded in New York open-outcry compared to the 4,664 lots officially tallied in floor trade on Friday, when 24,011 lots traded on the ICE electronic platform.
As of June 15, open interest fell 1,044 lots to 160,044 contracts. Meanwhile, Nicaragua's coffee exports fell 8.7 percent in May from the year-ago period to 126,004 60-kg bags, national export agency Centrex said on Friday. On the weather front in the Brazilian coffee belt, it will be mostly dry with near to above-normal temperatures through on Saturday, DTN Meteorlogix forecast.