March 16, 2006

 

Thursday: China soybean futures settle lower on CBOT losses; corn down

 

 

Soybean futures on China's Dalian Commodity Exchange settled lower Thursday on short selling triggered by overnight losses in Chicago Board of Trade soybean futures, analysts said.

 

The benchmark September 2006 contract settled RMB24 lower at RMB2,672 a metric tonne, after trading between RMB2,666/tonne and RMB2,685/tonne.

 

Trading volume for all soybean contracts rose to 76,202 lots from 33,506 lots Wednesday.

 

Short selling is still tentative without a clear signal from CBOT, and range-bound trading may continue in the short run, said Tang Yi, an analyst with Capital Futures Co.

 

"With the harvest of beans in South America, bearish fundamentals spurred some speculators to build up short positions, but the majority of investors chose to wait for a CBOT breach," Tang said.

 

Trading of Dalian's soybean futures has generally been inactive since February. Range-bound price movements have kept local speculators away, especially since they could profit from volatile local commodities futures, such as sugar, fuel oil and metals.

 

No. 2 soybean contracts, which are encouraged to be delivered with soybeans harvested from genetically modified crops, settled lower.

 

The benchmark September contract fell RMB22 to settle at RMB2,585/tonne.

 

Soymeal futures settled lower on short selling, along with soybeans.

 

The benchmark September 2006 contract fell RMB25 to settle at RMB2,284/tonne, after trading between RMB2,276/tonne and RMB2,298/tonne.

 

Soyoil futures settled mixed. The benchmark September 2006 contract settled RMB20 lower at RMB5,209/tonne.

 

Corn futures settled slightly lower, as long liquidation continued to dominate the market because of bird-flu concerns.

 

The benchmark September 2006 contract settled RMB11 lower at RMB1,406/tonne.

 

Open interest for all contracts fell 34,074 lots to 620,222 lots.