It has been a case of easy come, easy go the past two days with yesterday seeing all of Wednesday’s gains wiped out, and so the calmer start to today’s session will have been welcomed by those caught up in the previous volatility. A low volume morning saw Jul’23 prices confined between 26.00/26.24, and despite more sizable gains being seen for the white’s market there seemed little interest from the longs to drive the market back higher. It was only the arrival of the Americas based participants that prompted a little more movement into the environment with new daily highs established in the 26.30’s though the efforts felt somewhat muted with the low volumes suggesting that many traders already had their eyes looking toward the weekend. This was backed up with a retreat into the range, leaving the final couple of hours to be spent treading quietly either side of 26.20. Again, there was little change to nearby spread values, and a quiet close saw Jul’23 end the week at 26.22, in line with expectations of short-term consolidation though still well placed overall should the longs look to continue the squeeze when we draw closer to the Jul’23 expiration.
Having see-sawed over the past two sessions the market started today with a bounce back up into the same range, light consumer buying interest proving sufficient to bring Aug’23 up to a mid-morning high of $713.50. Volume was light and so as the buying eased so the price started to fall back into the range, though the drift lower was clearly based on apathy with sellers continuing to be hard to find. Despite the slide back to $708.00 the market was still standing firm in real terms, reflected in the white premium values which had gained a few dollars on settlement to see Aug/Jul’23 valued above $135.00. Moving into the afternoon some fresh impetus was found from specs to push values quickly beyond the morning highs, and in turn this seemed to draw in some buying from longs keen to ensure a firm conclusion to a choppy week. Session highs at $718.30 put the market back in touch with the high prices of recent days, though with No.11 not finding the same enthusiasm prices once more pulled back to range despite the white premium strength. A period of calm ensued until the final 30 minutes when the market was again pushed higher, a successful effort in positioning positively ahead of the weekend with Aug’23 showing solid gains to end at $715.10 and the Aug/Jul’23 heading out at $137.00.
