Sugar stocks in demand

Shares of ten sugar firms rose by 0.29% to 4.86% at 15:15 IST on BSE after raw sugar futures on ICE soared to three-month highs on Monday, 25 February 2014.

Dwarikesh Sugar Industries (up 4.86%), EID Parry (India) (up 3.32%), Balrampur Chini Mills (up 2.98%), Sakthi Sugars (up 2.25%), Rana Sugars (up 1.89%), KCP Sugar & Industries Corporation (up 1.78%), Bajaj Hindusthan (up 1.24%), Dhampur Sugar Mills (up 0.63%), Triveni Engineering & Industries (up 0.48%) and Oudh Sugar Mills (up 0.29%), edged higher.

The S&P BSE Sensex was up 47.89 points, or 0.23% at 20,859.33.

Raw sugar futures on ICE soared to three-month highs on Monday on worries about potential crop damage from dry weather in Brazil. Raw-sugar futures for May delivery rose 3.6% to 17.68 cents a pound on ICE, after touching 17.79 cents, the highest for a most-active contract since 19 November 2013.

Rising global sugar prices will help domestic sugar companies increase exports and offset the impact of falling production.

India's sugar output fell over 13% to 14.4 million tonnes so far this year on delayed crushing. Mills had manufactured 16.58 million tonnes of sugar in the corresponding period of the 2012-13 marketing year (October-September), according to industry body Indian Sugar Mills Association (ISMA).

On exports, ISMA said about 850,000 tonnes of sugar has been sold in the overseas market till January of this year. Of this, 450,000 tonnes was raw sugar and the rest refined. Another 1.2 to 2 lakh tonnes, mostly raw sugar, are in transit for getting exported, it added.

The country had sugar stock of 11.7 million tonnes till January this year. ISMA, which has pegged sugar output at 25 million tonnes for this year, said it will soon review the estimate figures.

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