By Keith Brown, DTN Contributing Cotton Analyst 

The cotton market was lower Tuesday as traders are trying to factor in a negative Fed announcement Wednesday and global spreading of the omicron variant.

The Federal Reserve is meeting Tuesday and Wednesday to decide whether to fast track its tapering process. The recent inflationary CPI and PPI reports are giving the Fed the necessary justification for such a move.

The omicron variant is spreading across the U.S. and now represents 3% of COVID-19 samples analyzed by the CDC in Atlanta. A week ago, the variant only appeared in less than 1% of samples being assessed. The United Kingdom issued a level 4 COVID-19 alert on Sunday, a step below the highest warning level. To that end, energy prices fell after the IEA (International Energy Agency) reported that omicron is set to adversely affect global demand recovery.

The National Bureau of Statistics indicated Tuesday that China’s 2021 cotton output fell 3% to 5.73 million long tons. China’s planted area for 2021 was down 4.4% to 3.03 million hectares but yields were considered good. Nonetheless, traders view last week’s USDA data as supportive, especially the 1.2 million bales decline in global stocks. Thus, current expectations are that China will be a major buyer of U.S. cotton into the next year based on need.

Tuesday, March cotton settled at 105.90 cents, down 0.91 cent, July ended at 102.35 cents, down 0.85 cent and December ended at 89.69 cents, 0.23 cent lower; estimated volume was 16,479 contracts.