Pepper market on Tuesday witnessed a mixed trend on limited activities but remained volatile throughout the day.

Opened at a firmer trend, the market touched the highest price of the day and traded with high volatility. It dropped to the lowest levels in the forenoon and started moving up with high fluctuation. The market ended nearly steady with marginal changes.

Continuous “push and pull” was visible in the market. Speculative buying by bull operators kept the market bullish. In that process, trade sources said, small and medium players were allegedly “squeezed out”.

Investors were buying at Rs 2-Rs 3 below the September delivery price and selling at October price. People were said to be regularly buying during the past few days because of the sunshine. Processors were selling MG-1 on the exchange platform, and investors were buying.

Farmers and dealers started selling as the prices crossed Rs 300 a kg. But most of the material arriving at present is old stock; and in some cases the quality is claimed to be deteriorated due to poor storage facilities, market sources told Business Line . They said that authorities should initiate steps, as they did some time ago, to educate the farmers and primary market dealers on better post-harvest technology so to keep pepper in dry conditions without moisture and fungal attack.

There was additional buying but the activities were limited. On the NCDEX, September contract moved up by Rs 8 to close at Rs 32,926 a quintal while October and November declined by Rs 43 and Rs 17, respectively, to close at Rs 33,374 and Rs 33,684 a quintal.

Turnover dropped by 580 tonnes to 10,334 tonnes. Open interest went up by 297 tonnes to 11,944 tonnes.

September open interest increased by 266 tonnes to 9,161 tonnes while October and November moved up by 17 and 8 tonnes respectively to 2,453 tonnes and 166 tonnes.

Spot prices remained steady on matching demand and supply at previous levels of Rs 30,000 (ungarbled) and Rs 31,000 (MG 1) a quintal.

Indian parity in the international market was at $7,400-$7,450 a tonne (c&f) and remained in line with other origins, which were also reportedly firmer. The trend in Brazil, where there were holidays, would be known tomorrow, they said.

Buyers overseas appear to have been shocked by the sudden spurt and are waiting and watching, they added.

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