Rubber Witnesses Down Trend

Kottayam: Domestic rubber rates continued under pressure as global rubber futures were in a corrective phase on March 14. On the physical front, RSS 4 declined to Rs 87 a kg from 87.75 and Rs 88 a kg respectively at Kottayam and Kochi. The rubber futures lost heavily in the morning session but the distant contracts bounced back later and closed in green on fresh buying and short covering on NMCE. The March contract completed at Rs 85.01(89.01), April at Rs 88.90 (88.69), May at Rs 92.49 (91.75) and June at Rs 95.75 (95.01) per kg for RSS 4. The April contract for the grade was marginally weak at Rs 89.30 against Rs 89.42 a kg on MCX. The April futures for RSS 3 declined to 255.5 Yen (Rs 97.58) from 260.4 Yen a kg at TOCOMPhysical prices were (Rs/kg): RSS-4: 87 (87.75); RSS-5: 86 (87); ungraded: 85 (86); ISNR 20: 86 (86.50) and latex 60 per cent: 62.10 (62.10).