TOKYO (July 3): Benchmark Tokyo rubber futures ended 1.4% higher on Monday on the back of firm global oil prices and a weaker yen which makes yen-denominated commodities cheaper for holders of other currencies.
Oil prices extended gains on Monday, lifted by the first fall in US drilling activity in months, while the dollar added 0.1% to 112.435 yen, which was seen as a knee-jerk reaction to Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s Liberal Democratic Party suffering a historic defeat in an election in the capital Tokyo.
A Tokyo-based broker said that a clear trend is absent in metals and money was flowing into crude oil and rubber.
The Tokyo Commodity Exchange rubber contract for December delivery finished 2.9 yen higher at 203.9 yen (US$1.81) per kg. The contract hit a one-month high of 206.9 yen on Friday.
Ivory Coast, Africa’s leading grower of natural rubber, exported 234,526 tonnes of natural rubber in the first five months of 2017, up nearly 30% from the same period a year earlier, provisional port data showed on Friday.
The most-active rubber contract on the Shanghai futures exchange for September delivery rose 140 yuan to finish at 13,560 yuan (US$1,998) per tonne, staying close to a one-month high of 13,680 yuan hit on Thursday.
The front-month rubber contract on Singapore’s SICOM exchange for August delivery last traded at 153.60 US cents per kg, down one US cent.
(US$1 = 112.5300 yen)
(US$1 = 6.7883 Chinese yuan)
