By Keith Brown, DTN Contributing Cotton Analyst
The cotton market sloughed off bearish financial markets to stage a stout recovery rally Thursday. The cotton complex finished with triple-digit gains. Earlier Thursday morning cotton succumbed to the weakness in the Dow, dollar, crude and gold as those markets faced bearish GDP Data, higher jobless claims, and poor consumer/retail numbers. Still, with strong old crop weekly sales numbers, and higher actual shipments than last week, cotton decoupled and traded higher.
Friday marks the end of the 2019-20 season, and it has been an interesting one. Even under the shadows of tariffs and geopolitical troubles with China, it eventually was the No. 2 buyer of U.S. cotton, with Vietnam being top. Still with China, there’s the rub about sales versus shipments, but based on its actions, as opposed to it words, it’s “a customer.”
December cotton is entering the last of the week and month in a dramatic way. Thus far, for the week, new crop is up 3.08 cents, for the month it is up 2.30 cents, and for the year, December cotton is down 7.18 cents. However, at one time, back in April, the market was off 15.00 cents for the year.
The NHC continues to track tropical storm Isaias as it forms and builds. Already, its directional path shifted from Florida’s Gulf coast to its Atlantic side. So, as it wobbles about, no doubt its path will alter.
For Thursday, December cotton closed at 63.18 cents, up 1.57 cents, March settled at 63.81 cents, up 1.49 cents and December 2021 finished at 63.19 cents, up 0.98 cent. Estimated volume was 20,340 contracts.