The Cotton Marketing Planner
The Cotton Marketing Planner

The Cotton Marketing Planner

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Cotton Market Summary as of Friday, October 17 2025

Through Friday, October 17, ICE cotton futures peaked early, descended steadily, then bottomed and reversed into a more gradual and bumpy ascent back towards the weekly highs (see chart above courtesy of Barchart.com). On Friday the Dec’25 settled at 64.28 cents per pound while the more distant Dec’26 settled at 68.10 cents.  Chinese cotton prices were mixed this week while the A-Index of world cotton prices declined.

Other futures markets followed various pathways this week  CBOT corn started the week flat to lower before stair stepping higher over the latter half of the week.  CBOT soybeans followed a similar pattern as corn, albeit with a smoother ascent.  KC wheat futures also started the week flat to lower, then took a big step higher, and proceeded to gyrate in a sideways pattern.  ICE WTI crude oil futures stepped up, traded sideways, stepped lower, and then gyrated sideways. The U.S. Dollar Index started the week in a gradual uptrend before switching in to steeper and longer down-trend.  Other macro influences (i.e., GDP, inflation, and interest rate policy) remained mixed in their expectation and implication for slow economic growth.

Cotton-focused market influences were hard to document in the absence of regular weekly data from USDA NASS and USDA FAS due to the federal shutdown.  USDA AMS this week reports lower spot prices this week and very light to moderate demand.  As of October 16, AMS also reports 13% of forecasted U.S. production being classed.

Recent harvest weather influences included widespread clear skies with scattered rainfall limited to California, Arizona, and the Atlantic seaboard. The onset of La Niña conditions could contribute to a drier fall.  This could be neutral/beneficial to the maturing 2025 crop, at the cost of early dryness in early 2026.  On the other side of the world, the precocious Indian monsoon is stronger/later than normal in what should be the withdrawal phase. It remains to be seen whether recent floods in India and especially Pakistan are a net benefit or detriment to summer-sown crops like cotton.

Through Thursday, October 15, the shifts in ICE cotton open interest were mostly higher compared to the previous day.  Combined with the mostly lower price settlements, this had the appearance of more short positioning, at least through Tuesday.  Unfortunately, this cannot be confirmed since the federal shutdown prevented an update of the Tuesday (September 23) snapshot of speculative open interest. The latter reflected short positioning with 1,723 additional hedge fund shorts, week over week, reinforced by 1,582 fewer (liquidated) hedge fund longs and a 2,808 position contraction of the index trader net long position.

The dynamics of ICE cotton futures may also represent a wet blanket on the market.  It remains true that unfixed call sales (by mills) are at an historically low level, perhaps reflecting the cautionary buying on the demand side. In terms of ratios, unfixed call purchases (by suppliers) outweigh unfixed call sales by over two-fold across all contracts, as of September 19 (not updated due to the federal shutdown).  For the Dec’25 contract alone, there were over three unfixed call purchases for every unfixed call sale.

For more details and data on Old Crop and New Crop fundamentals, plus other near term influences, follow these links (or the drop-down menus above) to those sub-pages.

Πηγή: TAMU

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