Feb 14 (Reuters) -U.S. cotton futures climbed to a more than one-year peak on Wednesday, steered by firm demand and tight supplies, but analysts expressed doubts about whether demand will continue to hold at these high price levels.
* Cotton contracts for May CTc2 rose 2.7 cents, or nearly 3%, to 94.76 cents per lb by 11:57 a.m. ET (1657 GMT), its highest level since late September 2022.
* The carryout is just simply too low, and demand is too high, which has helped prices, said Rogers Varner, president of Varner Brokerage in Cleveland, adding that "there are hardly any certified stocks."
* "Speculative traders have all the buying power at the moment."
* The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) in its February World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates(WASDE) report said the 2023/24 U.S. cotton balance sheet has lower ending stocks relative to last month. It also raised the export forecast by 200,000 bales to 12.3 million.
* Certified cotton stocks, which can be delivered against the contract, were at 999 bales compared with 2,213 bales on Jan. 12, according to ICE data.
* Traders now await the USDA weekly export sales data due on Thursday. Last week's report showed net sales of 284,100 running bales for 2023/2024 and exports of 248,500 running bales for the period ending Feb. 1. EXP/COT
* Export sales and shipments have been "inconsistently good," but the trend over the past 10 weeks has clearly been up, Don Shurley, professor emeritus of cotton economics at the University of Georgia, wrote in a note dated Tuesday.
* "If we expect higher prices to continue and not fall out of bed, demand/buying needs to show up at these higher prices, and exports need to validate this demand," he added.
* In the grains market, Chicago soybean and corn futures eased to three-year lows while wheat fell sharply as a strengthening dollar fuelled export concerns for U.S. crops that face stiff competition from ample global supplies. GRA/
Reporting by Ashitha Shivaprasad in Bengaluru; Editing by Tasim Zahid