SOFTS-Cocoa futures climb on tight supplies, coffee falls

Updates with settlement prices

LONDON, March 17 (Reuters) – Cocoa futures on ICE rose on Friday, boosted by tight supplies in Ivory Coast, while coffee and sugar prices fell.

COCOA

* May New York Cocoa CCc1 settled by $50, or 1.9%, to $2,738 per tonne.

* “We expect lingering concerns over tight supplies to continue to support prices, with reports of Ivorian exporters about to default on their contracts due to insufficient supplies of cocoa beans” , Fitch Solutions said in a note.

* May London Cocoa LCCc1 tuned 28 pounds, or 1.4 percent, to 2,102 pounds per ton.

* A total of 72,280 tonnes of cocoa was tendered for the ICE March London cocoa contract LCCH3 which expired on Thursday, according to exchange data.

COFFEE

* May arabica coffee KNc2 settled 3.45 cents, or 1.9%, at $1.766 a pound.

* Traders noted Arabica coffee stocks on the stock market were up again after their recent drop to a calendar year low.

* Certified arabica stocks at the Intercontinental Exchange stood at 788,915 60kg bags on March 16, the highest in more than two weeks.

* May robusta coffee LRCc2 was $40, or 1.9%, at $2,064 per tonne.

SUGAR

* Can raw sugar SBc1 was 0.09 cents, or 0.4%, at 20.67 cents per pound.

* Dealers said turmoil in the banking sector this week helped put the market on the defensive.

* Concerns about dwindling production prospects in the European Union and countries such as India, Thailand and China, however, continued to support the market.

* Indian mills have produced 28.2 million tonnes of sugar since the start of the current season on Oct. 1, down 1% year on year, the Indian Sugar Mills Association said on Friday.

* May white sugar LSUc1 settled down $0.50, or 0.1%, at $585.10 a tonne.

(Reporting by Shariq Khan and Nigel Hunt; Editing by David Goodman, Hugh Lawson and Shounak Dasgupta)

((Shariq.Khan@thomsonreuters.com; Twitter: @shariqrtrs))

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