Keith Brown DTN Contributing Cotton Analyst    

The market settled sharply higher Friday, as traders short-covered into the weekend. Additionally, India has extended its deadline to import cotton without paying import taxes until Oct. 31. Also, U.S. weather will remain hot and dry in many producing key areas next week.    

Friday afternoon at 3:30pm, the CFTC will issue its commitment of traders report. The big number there will be the status of the managed-money funds. Last week they were roughly 46,000 contracts net long.    

The Labor Department issued its jobs data and non-farm payrolls in June increased by 372,000, topping the 250,000 estimate. The unemployment rate remained at 3.6%.    

Crude oil traded higher Friday, but is still on track for a weekly decline as concern over a potential recession-driven demand downturn outweighed tight global supplies. Central banks are raising interest rates to fight inflation, while mass COVID-19 testing in Shanghai this week stoked fears of potential lockdowns that could also hurt oil demand.    

For the week, December cotton was down 1.85 cents, for the month, it was down 3.21 cents, but up 2.98 cents on the year.    

For Friday, December closed at 95.63 cents, plus 3.75 cents, March 2023 finished at 91.81 cents, 3.81 cents, and July 2023 settled at 87.62 cents, 3.76 cents higher; estimated volume was 47,664 contracts.    

Keith Brown can be reached at commodityconsults@gmail.com 

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