ICE Raw Sugar Books a Third Weekly Drop to 18.24 Cents as India's Crushing Season Surges Four-Fold

ICE raw sugar closed out a third consecutive weekly decline on Friday, with the benchmark March contract settling at 18.24 cents per pound, down 1.72 percent on the day and 5.79 percent for the week from last Friday's 19.36 cents, the lowest close in about five weeks after an intraday low of 18.13 cents, according to Yunnan Sugar Network's weekly review carried by Sina Finance. London's white sugar contract edged up 0.46 percent to $502.20 a tonne on Friday short-covering but still lost about 2.73 percent across the week. The slide has erased more than 14 percent of the price since October's 21.29-cent peak, breaking every major moving average as funds unwind the weather premium built during October's 9.8 percent rally.

The single biggest driver is India's unusually fast start to the 2026/27 crushing season. ISMA data show 184 mills operating by November 5 with cumulative output of 1.285 million tonnes, roughly four times the 320,000 tonnes crushed by the same date last season, and Maharashtra alone accounts for 136 mills and 1.078 million tonnes, according to the industry association's release carried by AgroSpectrum India. The National Federation of Cooperative Sugar Factories put output at 845,000 tonnes by October 31 with 152 mills running versus 31 a year earlier, though national recovery rates of 8.01 percent trail last year's 8.44 percent, and ISMA says some 3.6 million tonnes of carryover stocks leave domestic festive-season supply comfortable.

Brazil is adding pressure through the currency channel even though its physical numbers are weak. The real's slide since the October 25 election, deeper than 8 percent, lifts local-currency returns on dollar exports and has encouraged mills to hedge forward production, while the United States Department of Agriculture has cut its 2026/27 Brazilian sugar production estimate to 42.2 million tonnes, FX678's market commentary noted. Centre-South crush in the first half of October was down 17.8 percent year on year and sugar output down 23.3 percent amid persistent rain, and October exports fell 22 percent, so the market is effectively trading a future export recovery that has not yet shown up in the data. CFTC positioning backs the reversal: non-commercial net longs fell about 16,100 contracts to roughly 185,500 in the week to November 3, and the International Sugar Organization still forecasts a 200,000-tonne global deficit for 2026/27, a reminder that the surplus narrative is not settled.

For China, the board shows the same drift: Guangxi milling-group quotes sit at 5,160 to 5,260 yuan per tonne with new-crop pre-sales at 5,400 to 5,470 yuan, per Everbright Futures' daily note, and Market Pulse Scope's US sugar series tracks 18.45 cents, down 4.58 percent on the week. Traders are now watching the 18.13-to-18.02-cent support shelf for signs of a technical bounce, with India's crushing pace and Brazil's biweekly production updates the swing factors into mid-November.