December jumped to a new intraday high for the move. U.S. all-cotton 2015-16 export commitments rose to 108% of the USDA estimate and shipments reached 92%.
Cotton futures finished at a 13-session high close Friday, jumping to a new intraday high for the move but settling nearly a penny from the peak.
December closed up 66 points to 65.81 cents, in the upper half of its 230-point range from down 70 points at 64.45 to up 160 points at 66.75 cents. It dipped just below the prior-session low in the early minutes of overnight trading and settled on its highest close since June 20.
March settled up 73 points to 65.93 cents. For the week, December gained 82 points and March added 69 points.
The market rallied on the heels of USDAΆs delayed U.S. weekly export report showing the largest upland sales — 201,900 running bales — since March 31 and strong shipments. Sales were much larger than expected.
Volume quickened to an electronically estimated 31,000 lots from 17,878 lots the prior session when spreads accounted for 4,000 lots or 22%, EFS 29 lots and EFP 19 lots.
Net all-cotton export sales for shipment this season of 212,100 RB during the week ended June 30, up from 71,200 RB the previous week, boosted 2015-16 commitments to 9.42 million RB.
Commitments — outstanding sales of 1.358 million RB plus shipments — rose to 9.420 million RB, narrowing the lag behind year-ago bookings by 176,000 RB to 1.831 million RB or to 16%.
Cumulative sales were 108% of USDAΆs export projection, compared with 103% of final 2014-15 exports at the corresponding point last season.
All-cotton shipments of 315,200 RB, up from 239,700 RB the prior week, brought the total for the season to 8.062 million RB, narrowing the gap behind year-ago exports by 94,000 RB to 2.122 RB or to 21%. The USDA estimate is for exports to fall 20% from last seasonΆs shipments.
Exports reached 92% of the USDA forecast, compared with 93% of final shipments a year ago. To achieve the estimate, all-cotton shipments need to average roughly 167,000 RB for the remaining four weeks of the marketing year.
Net all-cotton sales for shipment next season of 135,500 RB hiked 2016-17 commitments to 1.993 million RB. While sales were down from 144,300 RB the prior week, the lead over forward bookings a year ago still widened by 71,000 RB to 342,000 RB.
Commitments for 2016-17 were 20% of the USDA projection. A year ago, forward bookings were 19% of the current 2015-16 export estimate.
Separately, U.S. 2015-crop upland loans outstanding declined 3,913 RB to 707,508 RB during the week ended Monday, according to the latest USDA figures.
Upland cotton under loan included 94,237 RB of Form A issued to individual growers and 613,271 RB of Form G issued to marketing cooperatives or loan servicing agents.
Futures open interest dropped 715 lots Thursday to 182,996, with DecemberΆs down 1,101 lots to 147,711 and MarchΆs down 26 lots to 22,637. Certificated stocks remained at 135,163 bales.
