December arabica coffee (KCZ26) closed down -2.75 (-0.92%) on Thursday, and November ICE robusta coffee (RMX26) closed down -32 (-0.94%).

Coffee prices extended their week-long slide on Thursday, with arabica dropping to a 1-month low and robusta falling to a 3-month low.  Coffee prices have sold off sharply over the past week on the outlook for Brazil’s coffee harvest to add more supply to the market.  Most warehouses in Brazil are no longer accepting new coffee supplies as space fills up, suggesting farmers holding back sales in hopes of higher prices will have to increase coffee sales as storage space dwindles. 

Bigger coffee supplies from Vietnam, the world’s largest producer of robusta coffee, are also weighing on robusta prices.  Vietnam’s National Statistics Office reported Wednesday that Vietnam’s 2026 coffee exports (Jan-Aug) rose by +13.7% y/y to 1.33 MMT. 

Above-normal rainfall in Brazil may benefit flowering for next year’s coffee harvest, a bearish factor for prices.  Somar Meteorologia reported on Monday that 8.9 mm of rain, or 127% of the historical average, fell in the week ended August 30 in Brazil’s Minas Gerais, the country’s main arabica-coffee growing region.

Last Tuesday, arabica coffee posted a 7.75-month high and robusta posted a 3-week high due to the slow pace of Brazil’s coffee harvest.  Safras & Mercado reported on Monday that the Brazil 2026/27 coffee harvest was 97% completed as of August 26, behind 100% last year and the 5-year average of 98%. Brazil’s arabica coffee harvest was 96% complete, behind last year’s 99%. 

Also, Brazil’s Cooxupe co-op reported Wednesday that 91.9% of the harvest was complete as of Aug 28, up 4 points from the prior week but still down slightly from 94.9% a year earlier.

Falling inventories are bullish for arabica coffee prices, as ICE arabica coffee inventories fell to a 27-year low of 223,712 bags on Thursday.  By contrast, rising inventories are bearish for robusta coffee as ICE robusta inventories climbed to a 9.25-month high of 5,004 lots on Wednesday.

Coffee prices also have support from the devastating earthquake last month in Colombia, the world’s second-largest producer of arabica beans.  Among the areas hit by the 7.4 magnitude quake were the coffee-growing provinces of Caldas and Risaralda, which account for about a quarter of Colombia’s production. 

Colombia has partially resumed coffee exports through the Buenaventura port, which handles most of Colombia’s coffee exports, according to a Bloomberg report on August 13 quoting the head of Colombia’s coffee exporters association, Asoexport.  Yet, traffic through the port remains intermittent and limited.  The report said the earthquake caused no significant damage to coffee processing and milling facilities, according to exporters.

Concerns that an El Niño weather pattern could hurt Brazil’s coffee crop next year are bullish for prices. Coffee trader Commercial said the El Niño weather pattern may delay rains in Brazil this September and October, when tree flowering normally occurs, hurting Brazil’s 2026/27 coffee crop. On July 8, the US Climate Prediction Center said the El Niño weather pattern that emerged across the equatorial Pacific last month will likely be one of the strongest in more than 75 years. This sets the stage for months of possible floods, droughts, and temperature fluctuations later this year that could hinder coffee production in Asia and South America. 

Soaring coffee exports from Vietnam, the world’s largest robusta producer, are bearish for robusta prices.  Vietnam’s 2025 coffee exports jumped by +17.5% y/y to 1.58 MMT.  Also, Vietnam’s 2025/26 coffee production is projected to climb +6% y/y to a 4-year high of 1.76 MMT (29.4 million bags).

The latest USDA biannual forecast was bearish for coffee prices.  On July 22, the USDA forecast that global coffee output in the 2026-27 season will rise by +6.0% (10.8 million bags) to a record 189.7 million bags, mainly due to improved growing conditions in Brazil.  The USDA expects global arabica production to rise +12% y/y, although robusta production is expected to fall by -0.7% y/y.  World ending stocks are expected to rise +1.9 million bags to 26.3 million bags.  On June 3, the USDA’s Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS) forecast a record 2026/27 Brazil coffee crop of 71.9 million bags, up +14% y/y.