By Keith Brown, DTN Contributing Cotton Analyst 

The cotton market posted triple-digit gains in the early going Tuesday, but by the clanging of the closing bell, prices were muted.

The cotton market posted triple-digit gains in the early going Tuesday, but by the clanging of the closing bell, prices were muted. Spot July lead the bullish charge, nearly hurdling the 60-cent mark, but was turned away with on-call fixation selling as well as outright speculative selling. Volume was an ordinary 23,498 contracts traded.

Tuesday afternoon, USDA will post its latest crop data, delayed by the Memorial Day holiday. We suspect planting efforts have made great strides over the past few days. Georgia producers to whom we spoke with indicated they are 75% complete. On the whole, due to the somewhat unusual cooler weather, the 2020 crop probably has one of the better stands than in recent seasons. However, some parts of south Texas remains inordinately dry. The most recent June 10 forecast has the Texas panhandle with above normal temperatures, but central Texas and Georgia carry below normal readings. Precipitation looks to be below normal for northern Texas on into the northern Delta, but above normal chances from south Georgia across middle Texas.

There is a “tropical thing” building in extreme southern Florida. The National Hurricane Centers gives it about a 20% of forming into something serious.

July cotton closed at 58.23 cents, up 0.62 cent, December ended at 58.00 cents, up 0.19 cent and March finished at 58.87 cents, up 0.14 cent higher.