March trades both sides of unchanged after closing the prior day on its highest settlement since Aug. 8. Cash grower sales jumped to the second highest of the marketing year to 62,163 bales on The Seam.
Cotton futures ticked a bit lower Tuesday, trading between modest overnight gains and slight morning losses a day after spot March settled on its highest close since Aug. 8.
March hovered off 19 points to 74.44 cents, just off the low of its 77-point range from the overnight high of 75 cents — a new intraday high since Jan. 5 — to 74.42 cents on a contract volume of 3,477 lots. May dipped 20 points to 74.97 cents on a turnover of 1,396 lots.
In outside markets, U.S. dollar index futures edged up 0.090 to 100.220, while Dow Jones futures traded up 10 points and S&P futures 1.75 points. Crude oil gained 40 cents to $53.15, Brent crude added 37 cents to $55.60 and February gold dropped $2.20 to $1,213.40. March corn was off 0.2%, March soybeans up 0.4%, March Chicago wheat down 0.5% and March Kansas City wheat up 0.2%.
Earlier, Asian stocks were mixed, down 0.6% in Japan’s Nikkei 225, up 0.2% in China’s Shanghai Composite Index and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng and down 0.1% in South Korea’s Kospi. In Europe, Germany’s DAX edged up 0.2% and France’s CAC 40 added 0.1%. Britain’s FTSE 100 gained 0.2%.
China’s Zhengzhou cotton futures settled 200 to 300 yuan higher and prices also closed on gains on the China National Cotton Exchange. India’s MCX cotton futures advanced and local prices remained firm.
In ICE cotton futures Monday, March surged to a triple-digit gain, climbing at the intraday high to within 43 points of the January high of 75.37 cents and finishing and finishing at its highest close since Aug. 8.
A lower U.S. dollar seemed all the bulls needed to activate early buy orders, a cotton analyst said, and mill fixations and short covering then joined in. The advance was in the face of by cert stocks growing an additional 5,720 bales to 123,246, highest since July 21.
The March-May spread traded from 66 to 42 points carry and narrowed nine points to settle at 54 points on a volume of 6,339 lots. May-July traded from 58 to 40 points carry and narrowed 10 points to close at 48 points on 1,864 lots. The inverted July-December intercrop straddle traded between 314 and 379 points and widened 67 points to a settlement difference of 373 points on 1,551 lots.
In cash online trading, grower-to-business sales jumped to 62,163 bales from 16,363 bales on The Seam. The volume was the second largest of the marketing year, exceeded only by a one-day turnover of 100,776 bales on Jan. 4, the highest since the establishment of The Seam in 2000.
Prices climbed to an average of 69.66 cents from 68.46 cents, reflecting gains to 15.75 cents from 14.40 cents in premiums over loan repayment rates.
Business-to-business trading, inactive the prior day, totaled 949 bales on prices averaging 69.30 cents and premiums averaging 16.51 cents.
The Cotlook A Index of world values gained 40 points to 82.45 cents, widening the premium over the previous-session March futures settlement five points to 9.41 cents.
