Cotton Fades into New Week

Overnight cotton positioning left the board triple digits in the red going into the day portion of Monday. Cotton prices were limit higher this morning. The board gave some of it back through the session, but still closed up by 304 to 381 points. December still ended the week at a net 185 point loss Friday to Friday. 

72hr Realized Precip data from NOAA shows a wet weekend for cotton country. Central TX got as much as 1 6/10ths of an inch, but was mostly in the 1/3 to 2/3” this weekend. The Southeast was much wetter with some fields in AL reporting 4 3/10ths inches in the past 72 hours. Most of GA got +1”. NOAA’s 7 day QPF calls for more of the same, with the forecasted week’s rain total in the 2-7” range (dwindling inland). Notably TX and OK will return to dry this week, missing out.

The Commitment of Traders report had managed money cotton traders as 40,686 contracts net long as of 7/5. That was a week to week drop of 6,052 contracts on rotation from long to short. Commercial cotton traders were 70,753 contracts net short as of 7/5. That was a 14,533 contract weaker hedge position on short covering through the week. 

USDA reported weekly old crop cotton sales were down 22% on the week and were 29% below the same week last year at 37,350 RBs. Turkey, Vietnam, and China were the largest buyers each with +10k RBs. Exports were 377,831 RBs during the week of 6/30, which brought the season’s total to 11.889m RBs. New crop cotton bookings came in at 381,855 RBs for the week of 6/30. That left the forward book as 4.45m RBs. 

USDA’s weekly Cotton Market Review had 616 bales sold this week for an average price of 105.39 cents. The Cotlook A Index was another 5 cents lower to 129 cents/lb. USDA’s new Adjusted World Price for cotton is 113.37 cents/lb after another 346 point drop. 

Oct 22 Cotton closed at 102.61, up 279 points, currently up 148 points

Dec 22 Cotton closed at 95.63, up 375 points, currently down 272 points

Mar 23 Cotton closed at 91.81, up 381 points, currently down 264 points