Thursday: China soy futures settle up, track CBOT; traders cautious

 

 

Soy futures traded on the Dalian Commodity Exchange settled higher Thursday, tracking an overnight rise on the Chicago Board of Trade.

 

The benchmark September 2010 soy contract settled RMB14 or 0.4% higher at RMB3,931 a metric tonne.

 

The contract opened 0.7% higher at RMB3,943/tonne, also the intraday high, and consolidated lower, finally closing near its intraday low of RMB3,918/tonne.

 

CBOT January soy ended 14 cents higher at $9.83 1/2, staging a modest recovery from a five-day slide on speculative buying.

 

But expected big supply from South America is likely to further pressure soy prices, making it more difficult for CBOT soy to recover to above $10 per bushel, said Galaxy Futures in a note.

 

Traders were exiting the market, with both trading volume and open interest declining.

 

Analysts expect DCE soy to be supported at RMB3,900/tonne in the near term, while RMB4,000/tonne could be a resistance level.

 

Trading volume for all soy contracts declined to 196,318 lots from 311,972 lots Wednesday.

 

Open interest fell 734 lots to 322,034 lots.

 

Corn futures, soymeal futures, palm oil futures and soyoil futures all settled higher.

 

Thursday's settlement prices in yuan a metric tonne for benchmark contracts and volume for all contracts in lots (One lot is equivalent to 10 tonnes):

 

               Contract   Settlement Price  Change     Volume

Soy         Sep 2010      3,931        Up   14    196,318

Corn       Sep 2010      1,897        Up    8    112,860

Soymeal  Sep 2010      2,888        Up   10    699,010

Palm Oil  Sep 2010      6,882        Up   62    479,514

Soyoil     Sep 2010      7,572        Up   56    780,710