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Insight Focus
Refined sugar prices held steady as forward sales rose. Some buyers advanced 2025-26 coverage after ASR’s refinery closure, while others hesitated amid demand uncertainty and rising offers. Spot market activity remained slow amid ample supply and strong crop conditions.
Refined Sugar Prices Steady as 2025-26 Sales Slowly Climb
Bulk refined beet sugar prices were steady to higher in the week ending June 27, as sales for 2025-26 crept higher. Refined cane sugar prices were unchanged. The spot market remained moribund. Sugar beet and cane crops improved from a week earlier.
Sales for 2025-26 were mixed, with some processors noting slow but steady activity and others indicating a noticeable increase in sales in recent days. It was suggested that the ASR Group’s June 20 announcement that it would close its Yonkers, NY, Domino Sugar refinery by year-end may have prompted some buyers to secure coverage for next year or act on outstanding proposals.
While the plant closing is expected to have minimal impact on overall sugar supply—as production and distribution are shifted to other ASR facilities—it may have a regional impact and, at a minimum, may disrupt logistics. It also highlights the risk of waiting too long to lock in forward supplies, especially with weather still a major factor this early in the 2025 crop year.
The percentage of prospective 2025-26 sugar production sold inched closer to 60% for some and exceeded that level for others. As the sales percentage increases, beet processors tend to raise offers to slow activity until they have a better sense of what production will be. One processor raised its offering price a few weeks ago; another increased prices by slightly more than 2c/lb in the latest week.
A number of buyers contracted for only a portion of their 2025-26 needs instead of 100%, due to uncertainty about demand for their products. They plan to supplement from the spot market, which may be at higher prices but allows them to avoid holding contracted sugar they do not need—as occurred for some this year.
Raising bulk refined sugar prices may prompt more buyers to enter the market for 2025-26. At the same time, it runs the risk of slowing sales too much, especially if other processors do not follow with higher prices.
Ample Supplies, Strong Crops Weigh on Spot Market Activity
The spot market remains problematic, with only a trickle of sales noted at levels near the quoted range. Supplies were ample. The USDA, in its June Sugar and Sweeteners Outlook Report, noted that the 2024-25 carry from 2023-24 was at a 12-year high.
Total sugar ending stocks as of April 30 were the highest since 2013-14. Cane refiners’ refined cane sugar stocks were at record highs and beet processors’ total stocks, as well as raw cane sugar stocks, were both near record levels.
Source: USDA
Good-to-excellent sugar beet crop condition ratings as of June 22 were unchanged to higher in all reporting states and were mixed but mostly higher compared to a year ago, the USDA said. Ratings were above 80% good-to-excellent in all states except Oregon (70%). Louisiana sugar cane was rated 77% good-to-excellent as of June 22, up from 75% a week earlier and the highest for the season to date.
Corn sweetener markets were quiet.
