MARKET COMMENTARY
Sentiments mixed in the major overseas natural rubber market as this week’s session begins.
On Monday, TOCOM rubber futures edged down while SHFE rubber futures gained more than two percent.
Bearishness prevailed in local natural rubber market as weak demand continued to suppress prices. Quotes for RSS4 in the spot market fell to its weakest level in more than six years.
MARKET NEWS
Weekly data from SHFE showed rubber inventories in the warehouses monitored by exchange rose 2.1 per cent to 261766 tonnes last week.
Thailand’s government will buy 200000 tonnes of rubber directly from farmers at prices of up to 60 baht a kilogram, nearly double the market price, in a bid to placate increasingly disgruntled farmers as prices dip to a seven-year low.
Thai government has ordered eight ministries to buy rubber to help struggling farmers.
China imported 500,000 tons of natural and synthetic rubber in November 2015, representing an increase of 51.5 per cent compared to the same month of 2014, according to statistics released by the General Administration of Customs of China.
The Thai government threatened on Thursday to cut rubber export quotas if traders did not play their part in stemming a slide in prices that has taken the value of the raw material to a seven-year low.
Thailand’s Bank for Agriculture and Agricultural Cooperatives will lend another 5 billion baht to rubber farmers seeking to do extra jobs during the ongoing price slump.
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Geofin Comtrade
