Keith Brown DTN Contributing Cotton Analyst    

The cotton market threatened a limit-up move Monday, as the West Texas forecast remains nil of any rain. In addition, surging outside energy, metals and grain markets, and India's halt on wheat exports, encouraged speculators to wade into the long side.    

Last Saturday, India announced it would no longer export domestic wheat as part of its food security policy. Of course, the implication is, it could easily halt cotton exports as well. The subcontinent is suffering from record setting heat and dry conditions.    

Monday afternoon, USDA will update the planting progress for the 2022 crop. The pace has been pretty much on historical schedule, given there are few hindrances. What will soon be needed is tons of rain to germinate the crop.    

The U.S. dollar was down Monday after trading a 20-year high last week. Creating a risk-off mood was the fact that China's retail and factory activity fell sharply in April as extensive COVID-19 lockdowns confined workers and consumers to their homes.    

For Monday, July cotton settled at 150.65 cents, up 5.45 cents, December closed at 132.96 cents, up 4.97 cents and March 2023 finished at 127.25 cents, 4.43 cents higher; estimated volume was 30,069 contracts.    

Keith Brown can be reached at commodityconsults@gmail.com 

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