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Insight Focus
US sugar prices remain under pressure amid weak deliveries and excess supplies. Forward sales for 2025-26 are advancing but still trail recent years. Crop conditions hold steady, while processors contend with unsold inventories and limited demand.
Weak Deliveries, Ample Supplies Pressure Market
Spot and forward cash sugar markets were divergent in the week ending July 3, with weak deliveries and excess supplies continuing to pressure nearby values, while forward sales advanced to 65% to 70% of prospective 2025-26 sugar production. Sugar beet and cane crops were developing well. US markets were closed on Friday, July 4.
Sales for 2025-26 were advancing, although still lagging behind the past couple of years. One processor raised its offer price for beet sugar last week, but others have not yet followed. Some said they were unable to obtain the higher price level and continued to sell at previously quoted values.
As a result, the 2025-26 price range widened on the low end. More widespread higher prices are expected at some point, however, once sales pass internal thresholds—especially since beet sugar remains at a wide discount to refined cane.
Some buyers indicated they would not enter the market until August. Others have been buying, but in some cases are not securing 100% coverage for next year. The major limiting factor appears to be uncertainty in demand for manufactured food products. Additionally, some manufacturers had excess contracted sugar this year and want to avoid a repeat next year.
With little indication that sugar supplies will tighten significantly any time soon, buyers likely will hold back as long as they can. At some point, though, beet sugar prices are expected to tick higher, and a buyer that waits too long may miss the bottom of the market.
Many see depressed No. 11 (world) raw sugar prices—due to ample supplies—as an ongoing pressure on the domestic market.
Processors Hold Unsold Sugar
Most (though not all) beet processors still have unsold 2024-25 sugar, and cane refiners are also facing limited demand in the spot market. Indications suggest that some beet sugar has sold well below the quoted spot price range and that loan forfeitures remain an option. Most agree processors will seek to avoid forfeitures at all costs, partly because of the message it sends while Congress is considering a new farm bill with substantially higher loan rates, which could encourage more forfeitures in the future.
Sugar deliveries for this year remain weak, depending on the sector. Some processors noted an uptick in deliveries in recent weeks, which is typical for the summer, but it was not enough to offset slow deliveries for the year.
Good-to-excellent sugar beet crop condition ratings as of June 29 were mostly unchanged to slightly lower from the previous week. The largest declines were in Michigan and Colorado. Crop ratings were above year-ago levels in all states except North Dakota and Wyoming. Trade sources generally rated the crops as average-plus, though not with “bumper” potential.
Louisiana sugar cane was rated 75% good-to-excellent as of June 29, down from 77% the previous week and the same as a year ago.
There was little change from a week earlier in the USDA’s analysis of the US Drought Monitor, with 21% of sugar beets in areas of drought as of June 24, and 49% of cane area—all in Florida.
The corn sweetener market was quiet.
