Arabica Coffee Ticks Higher; Orange Juice Rebounds

  NEW YORK - Arabica-coffee futures ticked higher Tuesday as erratic rainfall in Brazil's growing

areas continued to fuel concerns over the size of the next harvest after dry weather crimped this

year's production.

Arabica for December on ICE Futures U.S. was up 1.3% at $2.2100 a pound.

  Arabica-coffee futures prices have doubled this year as Brazil's worst drought in decades hurt

this season's crop from the world's top grower and has weakened trees, casting doubt over next

year's harvest.

  Most of the month has been dry for Brazil's main coffee-growing region and rains aren't expected

to hit until next week, according to Sao Paulo-based forecaster Somar Meteorologia.

  "If it doesn't rain until the end of the month it's going to be a problem," said Rodrigo Costa, an

analyst and a director at New York brokerage Newedge.

Brazil is the source of around half of the world's arabica beans.

  Orange juice for November was up 1.5% at $1.3525 a pound, after settling near a more than 11-year

low in reaction to a Nielsen report published by the Florida Department of Citrus that showed U.S.

retail sales of the breakfast beverage for the 2013-14 season dropped to the lowest level in at

least 16 years. Americans bought just 525.1 million gallons of the beverage in the year that ended

Sept. 27, according to the Nielsen data. That's the lowest since 1998-99, the oldest data available.

Cocoa for December was up 0.3% at $3,068 a ton.

  Europe's third-quarter cocoa grindings fell 1.1% on the year to 327,866 metric tons, figures from

the Brussels-based European Cocoa Association showed Tuesday. The figures, which measure the weight

of cocoa beans processed, are regarded as a proxy for chocolate demand.

  "Undoubtedly, the [traders are] still worried about all the risk to the price of cocoa should

there still be supply disruptions in West Africa," said Hector Galvan, a senior broker at RJO

Futures in Chicago, referring to the Ebola outbreak.

West Africa is the source of more than two-thirds of the world's cocoa.

  Raw sugar for March was up 0.2% at 16.70 cents a pound, while cotton for December was 0.4% higher

at 65.27 cents a pound.