New York cocoa futures shot up in early trade on Thursday on a stronger dollar and speculative buying, while Arabica futures were slightly higher, traders said. "There's just been all of a sudden some spec buying coming in. The industry's been buying and it looks like the specs got tired of selling to them and had to cover," one cocoa trader said.
On the electronic platform, ICE benchmark March cocoa jumped $24, or 1.24 percent, to $1,960 per tonne at 9:17 am (1417 GMT), ranging from $1,928 and $1,964. The rest were $8 to $23 stronger. In electronic trade, ICE March coffee rose 0.10 cent to $1.2905 at 9:15 am, trading in a tight band of $1.285 to $1.2975. The rest ranged from flat to 0.75 cent higher.