September 30, 2015
London (Platts) | http://goo.gl/Xs1x6a
The EU sugar market exported the total 1.35 million mt out-of-quota white sugar export allocation for the 2014/15 crop year by the September 30 deadline, the European Commission said.
Any of the allocated volume shipped out of the EU and arriving at destination past September 30 is subject to penalties. So, traders typically tie up loose ends by mid-month to allow time for shipping.
In the first week of September, one trade house told Platts it had shipped any volume remaining on its books by September 4.
The majority of the 1,500 mt sold was shipped to Jordan, and a smaller volume to Israel at $10/mt FAS over October White Sugar Futures (London 5).
The volume was shipped mainly out of Antwerp, but also Dunkirk. There was some reservation over the final price, given $20/mt FAS was widely considered the break-even point, but the trader said, overall, he was happy to have mitigated his losses when he did.
A few thousand tons were said to have gone through a week later, but the difference between trading one week later meant the seller was only going to reach agreement with a buyer at $5-10/mt FAS.
Sellers of a few hundred tons were then heard in France, Germany and the Netherlands Friday.
The volumes were said to be the scraps typically left in the hands of many producers at the last minute, heard sold as low as flat against the futures contract.
Last week, one Dutch producer said: "We do not have any out-of-quota sugar for this campaign. All volumes have been allocated destinations."
A trader said everything had been shipped out, and the 2014/15 campaign was "done and dusted".
Market participants are now eying the new allocation of the export licenses for 2015/16, which will be known by the end of October.
The market expects no volume to be exported until those licenses are allocated.
Notional values for exports out of Europe are now given at a $33/mt premium to the December (Z) London white sugar contract on an FOB basis.