COMMODITIES-Natgas jumps on cold weather; PGMs up on supply fear

* Natgas hits near one-year high on Eastern US weather
* Palladium, platinum surge on worries of supply deficit
* Arabica coffee off 5 percent, touches multi-month lows
* CRB index flat as 10 markets up, nine down

By Barani Krishnan
NEW YORK, Nov 13 (Reuters) - U.S. natural gas hit a near
one-year high on Tuesday, stoked by colder weather in the
eastern part of the country which relies on gas heat, and
palladium also rallied on fears of a supply deficit.
Most other commodities saw little price change as traders
remained focused on U.S. fiscal worries and renewed worries
about Greece's debt.
Arabica coffee sunk to multi-month lows and traders
said a stronger U.S. dollar, improved crop weather in top grower
Brazil and negative macro sentiment pressured arabica prices
down 5.0 percent.
Gasoline fell 1.1 percent to become another
significant loser aside from arabica. Soybeans gained 1.2
percent to join natural gas on the upside.
The Thomson Reuters-Jefferies CRB index, a
commodities bellwether, settled flat, with 10 of the markets it
tracks in positive territory and another nine in the negative
zone.
U.S. natural gas futures rose nearly 5.0 percent on Tuesday,
and nearly 7.0 percent in the past two sessions, backed by THE
colder Eastern U.S. weather, and expectations for the season's
first drawdown from inventories this week.
Front-month natural gas futures on the New York Mercantile
Exchange rose 16.9 cents, or 4.73 percent, to settle at
$3.739 per million British thermal units.
The contract rose as high as $3.745 in electronic trade,
just under the $3.82 high from two weeks ago, its highest mark
in about a year, according to Reuters data.
Platinum group metals (PGM) rose sharply as well after a
bullish forecast that production outages earlier this year could
create a supply deficit.
Palladium rose over 4.5 percent for its biggest one-day gain
in almost a year, after PGM specialist and refiner Johnson
Matthey said it expects palladium to record its biggest deficit
since 2000 this year as mine supply and sales of Russian state
stocks dwindle and auto demand climbs.
Johnson Matthey said it also expects the platinum market to
turn to a deficit in 2012 from last year's surplus on lingering
supply fears in South Africa, which accounts for 70 percent of
the world's supply.
Palladium rose 4.6 percent to $633 an ounce by 2:29
p.m. EST (1929 GMT), while platinum was up 1.4 percent at
$1,581.99 an ounce.
Prices at 6:06 p.m. EST (2306 GMT)
LAST/ NET PCT YTD
CLOSE CHG CHG CHG
US crude 85.35 -0.03 0.0% -13.6%
Brent crude 108.24 -0.83 -0.8% 0.8%
Natural gas 3.739 0.000 0.0% 25.1%

US gold 1724.80 -6.10 -0.4% 10.1%
Gold 1724.89 0.00 0.0% 10.3%
US Copper 347.10 0.30 0.1% 1.0%
LME Copper 7680.00 42.00 0.5% 1.1%
Dollar 81.110 0.075 0.1% 1.2%

US corn 723.50 5.50 0.8% 11.9%
US soybeans 1427.00 16.00 1.1% 19.1%
US wheat 851.00 -6.75 -0.8% 30.4%

US Coffee 146.00 -7.05 -4.6% -36.0%
US Cocoa 2395.00 14.00 0.6% 13.6%
US Sugar 19.35 -0.01 -0.1% -16.7%

US silver 32.487 -0.035 -0.1% 16.4%
US platinum 1584.40 19.90 1.3% 12.8%
US palladium 636.60 28.55 4.7% -3.0%