The better teas were "readily absorbed", while the poor leaf sorts were often neglected and where sold, lost out sharply in value, Forbes & Walker Tea Brokers said. The total of 7.34 million kilos on offer at the Colombo auctions made it the largest auction quantity for the year, Asia Siyaka Commodities said.
Prices of both low grown teas, which make up the bulk of the national production, and high grown teas, fell except for the better made teas, they said.
"Given the volume of tea on offer, the relatively lower quality and the strengthening rupee, the market can be termed satisfactory," Asia Siyaka said in a report.
Sri Lanka's tea production is recovering from the effects of severe drought earlier this year.
Forbes & Walker Tea Brokers said that given the quantity on offer, demand was "reasonably good", albeit mostly at lower levels.
"The bearish trend exp