Sugar Sag Snapped

Institutional buying of sugar
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on
Wednesday is translating to additional upside Thursday, triggering buy stops as
the March contract erases recent losses that have resulted in a four-month low.
Sugar also closed an overhead gap in the 9.20-9.22 area.

Traders are reassessing the blowup rally in natural
gas

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Wednesday, spawned by the
AGA’s mid-session report that showed storage levels fell. Moderating
temperatures, a two-week-40% rally, and a shifted view that the AGA storage
figures were not as bad as the all-time price reflects, all are working to pare
the recent strong run. Nat gas is down 6.30%, or -.395 to 5.870.

Dec. T-bond futures
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, from the
TradingMarkets Futures Indicators Momentum-5
List
, are pressing new highs. The recent rally in bonds to a 15-day high is
in response to the no-surprises Consumer Prices Index, which came in as expected
at +.2% and +.2% core for October. This translates to an annualized inflation
rate of 3.6% and 2.7% core. Energy prices make up about 10% of the CPI, with
natural gas–now trading at an all-time high (see Wednesday and Thursday’s Futures
Market Recap
)–rising 5%. Unemployment remains low, and inflation risk, but
is being compensated by rising productivity. At its current pace, inflation is
about one-third higher than in 1999, which helps explain why General Greenspan
and crew left rates and their policy bias unchanged (hawkish) at Wednesday’s
FOMC meeting. 

The Japanese yen
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, which joined the Implosion-5 List
after gapping down and closing at a
New 10-Day
and contract low Wednesday, is probing new lows, down .0018 at
.9216.

Also in the currencies, the
British pound

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continues its descent and to make good on its Pullback From Lows
reading.