Dear All,

I hope all’s well with you and wish you a happy new year…

The apricot market is firm and the prices are rising at Malatya these days. The farmers and raw material traders are holding the goods and not willing to sell at current levels with the expectation of higher prices in the coming weeks. Especially the big sizes and low sulphured apricots have very limited availability and higher prices day by day. We are expecting the increase on raw material prices to continue in the coming weeks.

The US$ currency decreased against Turkish Lira dramatically during the last 2 weeks of December 2017. Today’s currency is 3,75 TL against US$ which reflects a decrease of %5 in 2 weeks time. The change of the currency direction effected the apricot market in a negative way and the final export prices increased accordingly. The movement of the currency in the coming weeks will be a major parameter for the market.

The large size fruits such as Type 1,2 and 3’s and low sulphured fruits are very limited in the market recently. The price gap between large and small sizes as well as high sulphured and low sulphured apricots are getting bigger day by day. The natural apricots are pretty much available with reasonable prices presently.

As we are approaching to the critical bloom period during March/April 2018 months, it is hard to forecast where the market will go... Everybody wants to wait for March – April months to evaluate next year’s crop conditions which will be a major parameter for the direction of the apricot market for the rest of the season. The apricot prices stayed at low levels for a long time therefore the farmers/traders are looking for a reason to increase the market. As a result, we are expecting a slow supply of the raw material to the market which will create another pressure point on the raw material prices.We suggest all our customers to take their positions at current levels for the rest of the season. If there will be negative developments on currency or the new crop bloom, we may see sharp increases at the apricot market.

We also would like to share the following statistics with you for the export quantities of dried apricots during the new season in comparision to last season.

We are waiting for your concrete inquiries to prepare our special prices for apricots to refresh our businesses together.

Looking forward to hear from you.

Best regards, 
Yasin Durmus 
Managing Director