Oil fell, sugar was mixed, orange juice boomed and gold tracked the US dollar before falling Friday.
The US dollar was also a bit all over the place, falling, rising, falling, then rising.
Oil prices finished the week sharply lower, down nearly 5% on Friday on evidence that US consumers are weak and have no confidence in the current or immediate future state of the economy.
Gold fell on Friday as well, as did copper and other metals and all the major grains and other agriculturals.
Even orange juice was strong after it hit a recent peak on Wednesday to be up 45% from the start of July.
The main driver was concerns over Florida’s disease-hit citrus crop and signs that juice demand is improving.
US juice sales have been falling for the past seven years, but recent figures suggest that fall is being arrested, so prices have risen slowly from the four and a half year low hit in February, before the surge from the start of last month.
Frozen orange juice concentrate prices (that’s the stuff that’s traded in futures markets, so the juice is hardly ‘fresh’) fell 7.7% on Friday after hitting that peak of $US1.1215 a pound.
But that’s half the most high in early 2007. Juice prices peaked at a record $US2.095 per pound in March 2007 because of heavy damage to Florida’s orange trees from several intense hurricanes.
Sugar prices eased Friday in the US, losing 1% for the current contract which closed at $21.98 US cents a pound.
Sugar had peaked at a 25 year high earlier in the week of 22.20 US cents a pound.
Despite the fall Friday, it still ended up 5% for the week.
Helping sentiment were reports that major sugar users had written to the US government urging a lift in import quotas to keep a lid on prices in the wholesale and retail sectors.
The highly protected US sugar producers reckon there’s no need as they enjoy the ride of their cosseted lives.
Meanwhile oil prices fell Friday after being supported by overly optimistic investors and others believing US consumers will begin spending more.
That belief flies in the face of a string of official reports showing low or falling consumer spending, retail sales and confidence.
The current crude September contract on Nymex in New York dropped $US3.01 to settle at $US67.51 a barrel on Friday.
In London, Brent crude fell $US1.07 to settle at $US72.41 a barrel.
Oil fell 4.9% over the week in New York.
US natural gas prices fell to their lowest level this year.
The contract for September delivery dropped 9.8 cents to settle at $US3.238 per 1,000 cubic feet.
Speculators have been heavy losers in this market for much of the year as contrary to widespread belief, US gas supplies have surged with new finds and reserves estimates.
It will pay to watch oil in particular where a lot of big money is reportedly sitting as a hedge against the US dollar falling as American growth recovers.
Growth is not going to surge in a dramatic fashion simply because consumers are skint, increasingly homeless, losing their jobs or credit cards, or just too scared to spend except on food and other essentials.
Gas is used in the home and in industry and government reports have shown huge amounts of crude and gas being put into storage because of weak demand.
In the past fortnight US crude stocks have risen by nearly 7 million barrels.
Refiners have cut back on production for the past four weeks, petrol consumption remains weak and distillate stocks are high, meaning there won’t need to be an upsurge in oil purchases for the winter home heating oil production runs that will be starting soon.
Gold fell below $US950 an ounce and ended lower in New York on Friday as oil fell and the US dollar rose.
Comex December gold futures ended down $US7.80 at $US948.70 an ounce.
Spot gold ended at $US945.25, compared with $US953.50 an ounce on Thursday.
Gold ended down 0.9% for the week after Friday’s fall.
Among the metals, copper, nickel and zinc hit fresh year-highs during the week but ran into profit taking on Friday.
Copper fell Friday, but ended up 1.5% for the week.
The metal ended at $US285.19 a pound in New York, down 2.6%.
On the London Metal Exchange, three month copper reached $US6,465 a tonne before slipping to $US6,240.
A worry for copper investors was the sharp fall in Chinese imports in July, down 15% from July’s record.
That’s seen as increasingly bearish for the metal.
