By Keith Brown, DTN Contributing Cotton Analyst 

Cotton finished higher Thursday as speculators continue to stay the course of the long side of the move. They hope to see bullish supply/demand numbers Friday. To that end, the industry expects to see a reduced 2020 crop, increased exports and a decline in domestic inventories. Additionally, traders want to see a strong export sales report as well. Already, the managed money speculators are heavily long the market as talk has it that China will need to be a big buyer of U.S. cotton over time. To the latter, China was the dominant buyer of U.S. cotton last week.

Of late, there has been “moral pressure” placed on China by the European Union over human rights violations in certain locales. It’s believed China is using slave labor in some of its domestic textile operations, thus the EU is banning textile goods from certain provinces. To that end, the Trump Administration is considering similar restrictions.

The weather outlook for the Cotton Belt generally looks wet. The five-day forecast shows the potential for heavy rains across Central Texas, as well as into the U.S. Delta and the Southeast. Currently, the crop is rapidly opening, which suggests too much rain could affect the quantity and quality of the crop.

For Thursday, December cotton ended at 64.81 cents, up 0.61 cent, March finished at 65.82 cents, up 0.64 cent and December 2021 settled at 65.51 cents, up 0.61 cent. Estimated volume was 21,258 contracts.