Arabica coffee futures ended weaker on Friday in a continued correction after flirting with an eight-year high Tuesday, traders said.
"It's really quiet. The market's still consolidating after that reversal from earlier in the week when we were just shy of that $1.40 level, basis the March, and seasonally this market has a tendency to put in a top in mid-January," one dealer said.
Agricultural commodities will not trade on ICE Futures on Monday when the exchange shuts for the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday. It will reopen for regular trading hours Tuesday.
In the open-outcry pit the benchmark ICE March contract closed down 1.30 cents at $1.331 per lb. One contract aside, the rest retreated 0.55 to 1.25 cents. Electronically traded March was down 1.60 cents at $1.328 at 1:42 pm EST (1842 GMT), moving from $1.328 to $1.345.
"Now that we've already got all of the production news factored in, there just isn't bullish news to give the market that underlying support that it needs," a trader said.
The trader projected the market will continue to move downward until the March contract hits $1.20 to $1.25 - around where it was in November 2007. Meanwhile on the London International Financial Futures Exchange (Liffe), robusta coffee futures ended down a shade, continuing to consolidate after hitting a 9-1/2-year high last week. Liffe March finished down $5 at $1,988 a tonne, in narrow dealings from $1,986 to $1,999.
The ICE March robusta contract had not traded by 1:41 pm ICE estimated final open-outcry volume at 2,492 lots, compared with the 2,326 lots traded on the floor Thursday, when 13,299 lots traded on the electronic platform.