Keith Brown DTN Contributing Cotton Analyst    

In suffering its historical price melt, December cotton closed limit-bid Wednesday, as shorts covered and bottom-pickers emerged. Wednesday afternoon, USDA will issue two key reports, export sales and planted acres, with the latter carrying more influence. Thus, there was a lot of squaring Wednesday. Also, Wednesday marks the end of the month, end of the quarter and midyear. Often the managed funds and large investors tend to "reassess" their positions at such times.    

Weather-wise, the five-day forecast calls for moderate rains for West Texas, with temperatures expected to be above normal. The six- to 10-day and the eight- to 14-day outlooks indicate normal to below-normal rainfall, above-normal temperatures for much of the Cotton Belt.    

For Thursday's acres report, the average industry guess stands at 12.194 million acres. March's intentions were 12.234 million acres.    

On Thursday, USDA will issue its weekly exports-sales data. Last week's report saw another round of marketing-year low sales for the 2021-22 season, with sales at 16,800 bales. For 2022-23, sales were 277,000 bales, with China as the top buyer.    

For Wednesday, July cotton settled at 104.28 cents, up 4.16 cents, December closed at 97.48 cents, up 4.00 cents and March 2023 finished at 93.40 cents, 4.00 cents higher; estimated volume was 26,992 contracts.    

Keith Brown can be reached at commodityconsults@gmail.com 

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