Sugar #11 Mar’22
Yet another higher opening was quickly eradicated and in calm morning trading a long period was spent sitting within a tight 18.05/18.10 band. The monotony of this range was ended with some light buying as the Americas day got underway leading to a period back in the green, however March’22 could not work beyond 18.20 and with no assistance forthcoming from the wider macro the market retreated to sit quietly around unchanged. With the flat price showing no enthusiasm there was again a strong focus upon the spreads, and the March/May’22 continues to trade around half of the volume across the two nearby prompts with todays movement almost a replica of 24 hours ago with the differential moving out to 0.53 points before sliding back to the mid 0.40’s. Lower crude values in reaction to today’s slight calming of tensions over Ukraine brought some spec selling into the mix later in the afternoon, but though it extended values below 18c and through some of the consumer scale support there was no threat to the broader range. With tonight representing the March’22 option expiry it seemed that we may remain right around the 18c strike through to the close however some late short covering (and possibly buying against option considerations) took the spot month back up to settle at 18.07. The spread also widened back out against this buying to settle at 0.50 points to end another range bound session.