Rockmart Coffee Market Intelligence · Week 38 · Monday, September 14, 2026 · Santos / Panama City
By Thiago Martins
The week in one paragraph
Coffee trades the future, not the present — and this week the future did the talking. StoneX has the Dec/26 arabica settling Friday at 285.70 cents/lb, down 245 points on the day, with the market probing weekly support at 277–280. Certified ICE stocks are still hovering near their lowest of 2026, yet futures fell anyway. Why? Perception shifted: Brazil shipped a record 4.16 million bags in August, and roughly 65,000 bags — predominantly Brazilian — are now queued in pending grading at ICE. Pending coffee is not certified coffee, but its arrival changes how hard the market thinks it will be to rebuild stocks. Robusta settled at US$3,525/t, capped below 3,550.
Perception moves before the fundamentals
The physical picture has barely changed: certified stocks remain near 2026 lows, the curve is still inverted, and fine-cup coffee is tighter than commercial grades. What changed is the market’s read of what comes next. The Dec/March switch — a gauge of prompt tension — has eased toward 8.5–9.5 c/lb, well off late August’s wider backwardation, as pending-grading volumes build (StoneX: from about 62,390 to 64,955 bags on the week). StoneX also notes speculative funds continuing to trim bullish bets, adding pressure. Markets rarely wait for fundamentals to turn; they move when the probability of change moves — and this week the odds that Brazil’s record crop reaches the exchange went up.
26/27 crop outlook
- Record crop confirmed. Conab’s official estimate is 66.7M bags (+18% on the year), including conilon at 20.9M; StoneX runs higher at 75.3M.
- Surplus in view. StoneX sees the global balance swinging toward surplus in 2026 as Brazil and Vietnam expand output.
- Rain returned. Good rainfall across arabica regions has improved flowering conditions and trimmed the 2027 weather premium — though flowers are not yet coffee; fruit set from here is what matters.
- Quality mix softer. Safras & Mercado flags winter rains raising the share of lower-grade coffee, keeping fine-cup premiums firm against commercial grades.
Exports & logistics
Cecafé confirmed the pipeline is flowing: Brazil’s best August on record, 4.16 million bags (+31% year on year) for US$1.33 billion — robusta/conilon up 53.6% (a record August) and arabica up 25.7% on new-crop availability, with the U.S. and Belgium leading purchases. Through the first two months of the 2026/27 crop year (July–August), exports total 7.204M bags, up 21.5%. The Port of Santos is at peak-season load, where vessel scheduling and container availability are the practical limits. Rockmart ships EUDR-ready green coffee from Santos, Vitória and Rio de Janeiro, giving buyers redundancy across all three of Brazil’s coffee gateways.
EUDR corner
The deadline is now inside the quarter. The EU Deforestation Regulation applies from 30 December 2026 for large and medium operators and 30 June 2027 for small and micro enterprises; coffee sold into or exported from the EU must be proven deforestation-free after 31 December 2020, with plot-level geolocation and a due-diligence statement. The stakes are large: the EU took 43.8% of Brazilian coffee exports in 2025 — some 17.56 million bags worth around US$7.1 billion, per Cecafé — and Cecafé’s traceability platform now covers roughly 90% of EU-bound shipments, with georeferencing accurate to 50 centimetres. With the deadline weeks away, verified, documented lots are where scarcity and regulation meet. Rockmart delivers EUDR-ready coffee with the full documentation package from Santos, Vitória and Rio de Janeiro.
The week ahead
The set-up is finely balanced: certified stocks are still at 2026 lows and the curve inverted, but pending grading, a narrowing spread, accelerating Brazilian exports and returning rain all tilt the probability toward easing. Watch three things: whether pending coffee actually converts into certified stock, rainfall continuity through the September–October flowering (the main bull risk), and speculative positioning. With arabica leaning on 277–280 support (StoneX), momentum favours the downside unless the weather turns. The real traded 5.08–5.14 per dollar on the week (StoneX), itself a swing factor for Brazilian producer selling.
Prepared by Thiago Martins, Rockmart trading desk. For contract structures (spot, forward, EFP, multi-year) or the full EUDR documentation package, talk to us. This report is market information, not trading advice.