December 8, 2005

 

Thursday: China soybean futures settle slightly down on CBOT losses

 

 

Most soybean futures traded on China's Dalian Commodity Exchange settled slightly lower Thursday, in line with a small drop in Chicago Board of Trade soybeans overnight.

 

The benchmark May 2006 soybean contract gave up RMB4 to settle at RMB2,551 a metric tonnene, after trading between RMB2,543/tonnene and RMB2,562/tonnene.

 

Mild short selling dragged down the benchmark early in the session but short covering emerged before the end of trading.

 

The total trading volume for soybean futures on the Dalian exchange fell to 202,520 lots from 239,392 lots Wednesday.

 

One lot is equivalent to 10 tonnenes.

 

Trading was mostly uneventful due to a lack of fresh trading leads, analysts said.

 

"Market activity usually slows ahead of USDA reports," said an analyst. "The local market is expected to stay rangebound Friday."

 

The U.S. Department of Agriculture is scheduled to report its monthly World Agricultural Supply and Demand estimates Friday.

 

Most of Dalian's No. 2 soybean contracts, which are encouraged to be delivered with soybeans harvested from genetically-modified crops but are seldom traded, settled slightly lower.

 

The No. 2 May 2006 soybean contract settled RMB2 lower at RMB2,517/tonnene, after trading between RMB2,510/tonnene and RMB2,537/tonnene.

 

However, most soymeal futures traded on the exchange settled marginally higher on limited speculative buying.

 

The benchmark May 2006 soymeal contract edged up RMB2 to settle at RMB2,165/tonnene after trading between RMB2,155/tonnene and RMB2,175/tonnene.

 

Corn futures traded on the exchange settled slightly lower, mostly on some profit-taking in the late session.

 

The most widely held September 2006 contract lost RMB4 to settle at RMB1,308/tonnene, after trading between RMB1,302/tonnene and RMB1,313/tonnene.