Feb 22 (Reuters) - ICE cotton futures slipped more than 1 percent on Friday after combined weekly export sales data from the U.S. government fell short of investors' expectations.
* The most active cotton contract on ICE Futures U.S., the May
contract , settled down 1 cent, or 1.35 percent, at 73.01
cents per lb.
* "The USDA sales and exports report this morning was disappointing," said Keith Brown, principal at cotton brokers Keith Brown and Co in Moultrie, Georgia.
* "The fact that we did not sell over a million bales was psychologically negative, and lot of speculators chased the market yesterday on the big run-up and now they are coming out," Brown said.
* However, the second-month contract notched a weekly gain of 1.6 percent, its first rise in four weeks.
* Data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture showed net sales of 977,100 running bales for the fiber in the 2018/19 marketing year.
* "U.S. net export sales and shipments for the six-week period ending Feb. 14 were less than generally expected," said Louis Rose, director of research and analytics at Tennessee-based Rose Commodity Group in a note.
* Top U.S. and Chinese trade negotiators met on Friday to wrap up a week of talks that have seen the two sides struggle over the details of structural reform commitments by China, increasing the likelihood of extending the March 1 U.S. deadline for a deal.
* Total futures market volume fell by 4,422 to 42,897 lots. Data showed total open interest fell 7,202 to 216,593 contracts in the previous session.
* Certificated cotton stocks <CERT-COT-STX> deliverable as of Feb. 21 totaled 127,973 480-lb bales, unchanged from 127,973 in the previous session.
(Reporting by Brijesh Patel in Bengaluru Editing by Tom Brown)