According to Cooxupé, one of Brazil’s largest coffee cooperatives, 87.5% of the harvest had been completed by August 21, up 6 percentage points from a week earlier but still lower than the 91.3% recorded at the same time last year.

Previously, Safras & Mercado, a Brazilian agricultural consulting and analysis company, stated that as of August 12th, the country’s 2026-2027 coffee crop was 90% complete, lower than the 97% at the same time last year and the five-year average of 94%. Arabica coffee alone reached 86% completion, compared to 95% a year earlier.

Traders also said that rainfall in Brazil is forecast to improve this week and next, creating favorable conditions for some coffee flowering. This could improve the supply outlook for the coming months.

However, coffee is still very scarce in the short term.

One clear indicator is that the spread between September and December arabica futures is currently around 36 cents/pound, reflecting supply constraints in the near-term futures contract.

Earlier, September arabica futures rose to a 7.5-month high as investors holding short positions worried that the amount of coffee available for the nearest-term contract would not be enough to meet demand.

The fact that investors had to close their short positions by buying back contracts contributed to the sharp price increase in previous sessions.

Another paradox is emerging in Brazil: many warehouses are nearly full, but the amount of coffee available for delivery on the exchange remains very low.

Reports that some warehouses in Brazil are no longer accepting new coffee shipments suggest that farmers have been delaying sales in anticipation of further price increases. However, as storage capacity shrinks, more of this coffee may have to be released onto the market, putting additional pressure on prices.

Meanwhile, certified arabica stocks on ICE continued to decline. The amount of arabica coffee meeting delivery standards fell to just 224,617 bags on Wednesday, the lowest level in 2.75 years and near a multi-year low.

Brokerage firm ADMIS believes that slow harvesting progress and issues with coffee bean quality in Brazil are limiting the amount of coffee that meets the standards for certification and storage on the exchange.

Reuters quoted Mike Nugent, a coffee consultant and broker, as saying that delivery notifications for the near-term futures contract are proceeding quite slowly, with only a few dozen notifications issued.

This development shows that “the fact that coffee is available somewhere does not mean that coffee is available here, right now, and in a form suitable for delivery.”

While arabica is supported by the scarcity of coffee meeting delivery standards, robusta is under more significant pressure from increasing inventories.

Robusta inventories on the ICE exchange rose to 4,943 lots on Tuesday, the highest level in nine months. Robusta fell 2.9% on Wednesday to $3,691 per ton, after surging as much as 5.1% on Monday.

The contrasting trends between the two types of coffee indicate that the market has different assessments of the supply situation for arabica and robusta.

In the long term, the supply outlook is becoming an increasingly important factor for coffee prices.

The reversal in the futures market structure suggests that traders expect supply to improve in the future, but remain uncertain about the pace at which coffee from producing countries is shipped to consuming markets.

According to a Reuters survey , arabica prices are projected to fall by 8.8% by the end of 2026, while the market surplus for the 2026-2027 crop year could increase to 8.2 million bags, up from just 1.7 million bags in the previous crop year.