(Adds comments and closing prices)
NEW YORK, Oct 29 (Reuters) – Raw sugar futures on ICE rose on Thursday as supply prospects worsened with more excess El Nino-linked rains forecast in top grower Brazil, while arabica coffee hit a one-month low.
* Raw sugar settled up 0.13 cent, or 0.7%, at 19.47 cents per lb, extending its recovery from Monday’s 5.6% Brazilian currency-driven selloff.
* Sugar production in Brazil’s key center-south region fell 27.1% in the first half of October from a year earlier to 1.87 million metric tons, the Agriculture Ministry said on Wednesday.
* The country’s sugar areas have been battling excess El Nino-linked rains, and more are forecast for this weekend and for next week.
* “Sugar has been supported since July by declining forecasts for global supply, with heat and drought damaging Europe’s beet crop and a lacklustre monsoon lowering expectations for India’s cane crop,” added broker AMDIS.
* White sugar rose 0.4% to $527.60 a metric ton.
* ICE arabica coffee futures settled down 1.3 cents, or 0.5%, at $2.8545 per lb, having hit their lowest since late September at 2.8080.
* Weighing on coffee are signs the relentless drawdown in ICE-certified stocks might be moderating, with data showing more than 42,000 bags of coffee have arrived at exchange warehouses and are awaiting grading
.
* The weak Brazilian real is also weighing by encouraging mills, farmers and exporters in top grower Brazil to sell dollar-priced coffee futures because it raises their returns in local currency terms.
* Robusta coffee fell 0.7% to $3,176 a ton, having hit its lowest since March 2024 on Monday.
* Robusta is also under pressure overall as exchange stocks are rising strongly
and the harvest is getting underway in top grower Vietnam, weighing on domestic prices there.
* London cocoa settled down 15 pounds, or 0.4%, to 4,255 pounds per ton.
* Analysts at Expana have reduced their 2026/27 output forecast for top grower Ivory Coast by 40,000 tons to 1.83 million tons, citing “moisture stress impacting not only pod loads but also the overall health of the trees”.
* New York cocoa was little changed at $5,456 a ton.
(Reporting by May Angel and Marcelo Teixeira; Editing by Shilpi Majumdar, Shailesh Kuber, Tasim Zahid and Andrea Ricci )
