(WSJ) Coffee prices leapt on Tuesday, posting gains for the sixth session ina row as the developing global supply crunch seeped deeper into market sentiment.

Coffee futures have risen 20% since June 7. Traders have increasingly come to understand that two consecutive years of poor harvests in Central America and key coffee grower Colombia will put a dent in supplies that won't be offset by Brazil, which this year is expecting its biggest-ever harvest, albeit of lower-quality arabica coffee beans.

On Tuesday, arabica coffee for July delivery settled 8.40 cents, or 5.5%, higher at $1.5935 a pound on ICE Futures U.S.

The price of actual coffee beans trading hands in the so-called physical markets has long been at a premium to futures prices.

For example, the daily export price set by Colombia's National Federation of Coffee Growers was set at $2.232 cents a pound on Monday.

The move in futures prices probably won't immediately translate into higher beverage prices at roasters such as Starbucks Corp., who contract their coffee bean supplies well in advance and don't rely on the futures market.

Overall, however, the tight supply situation could pinch the pocketbooks of coffee drinkers over the longer term.

"The market is finally responding to the tightness in the physical market," said Judy Ganes-Chase, an agricultural commodities analyst and president of J Ganes Consulting in Katonah, N.Y. "A lot of people were looking at the large Brazilian crop as a salvation, but it's not."

The high-grade Brazilian arabica beans coming in since early June are being quickly absorbed by the caffeine-starved market, analysts say.

Trade in Brazil thus far into the harvest has been light because a standoff of sorts has developed: Producers are waiting for the highest price point to sell, while merchants are waiting for a flood of supplies to weigh on prices before they buy.

Compared with other commodities, coffee is a niche market and more vulnerable to price swings. In crude oil, 550,000 lots traded on Tuesday. In coffee, that number was 61,533 on what's considered a high-volume day.

Supply worries are being compounded by relatively low stockpiles of coffee that can be delivered against the ICE contract.

Coffee inventories on Tuesday fell by more than 4,000 bags, each weighing 60 kilograms, to 2.6 million. This time last year, these certified stockpiles totaled 3.663 million bags. European inventories also fell 4.7% on the month to 10.7 million bags as of end-April, according to European Coffee Federation figures released Monday.

Brazil is the world's largest coffee producer and No. 2 consumer. The coffee crop for the year ending June 2011 is forecast to be 23% higher at 55.3 million bags, according to a U.S. Department of Agriculture attache. Some industry estimates peg production at as high as 60 million bags.

Coffee is still cheaper than the historical average. In 1997, prices spiked to more than $3 a pound, a delayed reaction to a 1994 front in Brazil that hit output, Ms. Ganes-Chase said.

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