By Keith Brown DTN Cotton Correspondent
The cotton market finished higher Tuesday, posting new highs and new high closings for the year. The buying was led by short-sold speculators, who are now beginning to feel more than a tad nervous. This Friday, USDA will release its intentions guess for 2019, but we are hearing in many areas across the South the acres mix could be like 50/50 cotton to corn.
A major reason for that ratio is producers are needing some mid-summer income flow, and don’t wish to bet all the chips on a full cotton crop into fall harvest. Last year’s bout with hurricanes Florence and Michael still have many producers not only hurt financially, but psychologically as well.
Prior to the Intentions, Thursday will see USDA will release its weekly exports-sales data. From here forward these reports will become very crucial to the old crop’s price. With the 2018-19 sales pacing USDA’s five-year average, the market has a late season chance to overtake that average. Moreover, if China re-enters the export scene, the market has a great chance of exceeding it.
For Tuesday, May cotton settled 77.89 cents, up 0.16 cent, July finished at 78.78 cents, plus 0.27 cent and December closed at 75.97 cents, up 0.24 cent. Tuesday’s estimated volume was 29,830 contracts.
