Record coffee harvests in Brazil, the biggest grower, are compounding a global glut of arabica.
Brazilian farmers will reap 50.8 million bags in 2013, a record for a so-called low-crop season, according to the median of nine analyst estimates compiled by Bloomberg. The harvest reached 55.9 million 132-pound bags in 2012, an all-time high for a peak year. Output usually drops in alternate years because of growing cycles. Prices may fall 13 percent to $1.311 a pound by June 30, the average of 14 predictions shows.
Futures slumped about 50 percent since May 2011, as the highest prices in 14 years spurred Brazilian farmers to boost supply. Their exports jumped 54 percent to $8.7 billion in 2011. The flood of beans has continued, and stockpiles tracked by the ICE Futures U.S. exchange are headed for the biggest annual gain in more than a decade. Rising costs and concern that economies are slowing encouraged roasters and consumers to favor cheaper robusta beans.
«There’s a significant crop coming from Brazil if the weather continues to be favorable,» said Claudio Oliveira, the head of trading at Castlestone Management LLC in New York, which manages about $500 million of assets. «Abundant supply is the driving force in the market.»
Futures fell 34 percent to $1.507 this year, the biggest retreat of the 24 commodities tracked by Standard & Poor’s GSCI Spot Index, which gained 0.5 percent. Most agricultural products advanced this year, with records in corn and soybeans as drought parched crops from Australia to Russia to the U.S.
Brazil had record harvests in two of the past three seasons, almost doubling output in about a decade and now accounting for 38 percent of global supply, U.S. Department of Agriculture data show. About 72 percent of the country’s crop was arabica this year and the rest robusta, typically used in espressos.
Frost during Brazil’s winter in June and July may limit the drop in prices, said Marco Antonio dos Santos, an agronomist with Sao Paulo-based forecaster Somar Meteorologia. The last severe frost to limit output was in 1994, when a low-season harvest plunged 36 percent the following season, according to data from the International Coffee Organization in London.
Source: denverpost.com/business/ci_22149889/record-brazil-coffee-crop-adds-global-glut-arabica