* Fears of civil war mount in top cocoa grower Ivory Coast
* Sugar climbs, focus on deliveries in NY's March contract
Cocoa futures in the U.S. on Monday rocketed to a 32-year peak as gun battles in top grower Ivory Coast inspired fears a civil war would severely disrupt supplies from the beleaguered African nation.
Gunfire flared near the center of the Ivorian capital of Abidjan, inching closer to a full-blown civil war in a country that supplies about 40 percent of the world's cocoa.
New York's May cocoa contract <CCK1> gained $56 to finish at $3,695 per tonne, the highest settlement close in 32 years. The market rose 10 percent in February, its biggest monthly gain since September 2009.
Cocoa went up for the third month in a row and the catalyst for the surge is the turmoil in Ivory Coast. Liffe's May cocoa contract added 13 pounds to close at 2,381 pounds per tonne, a few ticks below the lifetime top of 2,385 pounds.
Open interest in the U.S. cocoa market, an indicator of investor money flowing into bean futures, ballooned in January and February to their loftiest levels in three years.
"Whoever's long is staying long and whoever's looking for the short isn't coming in," said Jimmy Tintle, analyst with Transworld Futures in Tampa, Florida.
The European Union has imposed sanctions on incumbent Laurent Gbagbo along with the people and institutions helping him stay in power after a November election he is widely recognised to have lost to presidential claimant Alassane Ouattara.
The institutions include the cocoa authorities and ports. A halt to cocoa-buying in Ivory Coast because of sanctions and liquidity problems has spurred smuggling of cocoa through neighbours like Ghana, farmers say, as the alternative is to let the beans rot on farms.
"At the moment, there's at least some movement of cocoa across borders," a London-based broker said, adding this could cease if civil war broke out.
Exporters estimated only around 1,000 tonnes of beans were delivered to the West African state's two ports between Feb. 22 and Feb. 27, down from 9,003 tonnes in the same week a year ago.
source: https://portal.hpd.global.reuters.com/