NEW DELHI: Raw sugar regained ground as traders parsed changing rules in India that allow refiners to temporarily import more of the sweetener duty-free.
Futures in New York inched higher after India said on Monday it would give refiners more time to import raw sugar duty-free, reversing an earlier decline of as much as 3%.
White sugar futures in London pared losses of more than 4%, but were still down on the day.
India last week said that it would temporarily allow refiners to import as much as one million tonnes of raw sugar without paying typical duties as long as the resulting food-grade sugar is sent into domestic markets.
Prices have fluctuated since as traders mulled whether there is enough time for much foreign sugar to reach India.
According to Monday’s rule revision, Indian refiners can process imported sugar without paying typical duties as long as they sell the resulting refined sugar in the domestic market within two months after arrival.
The initial rules required any sugar to be processed sufficiently in advance to enter the domestic market by Oct 31.
This is a tight timeline that analysts at GreenPool said would be a “tall order” that might only pull in cargoes already afloat.
The looser timeline “might help in increasing the imports”, according to Mike McDougall, analyst at McDougall Global View. — Bloomberg
