Markets gyrated in afternoon on FBI probe. Classing of upland cotton reached 3.699 million RB, 24% of the crop forecast. Upland outstanding loans rose to a million RB. Mills priced 797 lots in December.

Cotton futures surged from an early, lethargic dip to finish strongly higher Friday for the third session in a row of gains.

Spot December settled up 106 points to 70.82 cents, a seven-session high close and near the high of its 184-point range from down 51 points at 69.25 to up 133 points at 71.09 cents. It gained 175 points for the week.

March gained 98 points to settle at 71.26 cents and December 2017 added 82 points to close at 69.90 cents. For the week, March rose by 179 points and December 2017 by 82 points.

Markets gyrated in afternoon trading after the FBI said it was reviewing new evidence in presidential candidate Hillary ClintonΆs email server case.

Weakness in the U.S. dollar index, a large unpriced mill position, positive technical considerations and signs of solid economic growth in emerging markets contributed to the cotton gains.

Volume increased to an estimated 26,378 lots from 20,610 lots the previous session when spreads accounted for 8,927 lots or 43% and EFP 39 lots. Options volume totaled 4,048 calls and 4,891 puts.

U.S. upland cotton classing increased to 1,032,550 running bales during the week ended Thursday from the prior weekΆs 787,782 RB to bring the seasonΆs total to 3,698,607 RB, 24% of the upland production forecast.

Upland classing was up 27% from a year ago when 2,918,943 RB had been graded, 20% of the final output. Tenderable cotton accounted for 72.1% of the 2016-crop cotton classed for the week and 70.4% for the season, up from 69.8% and 69.7%, respectively, the previous week.

Pima classing of 33,871 RB, up from 15,661 RB the week before, boosted the extra-long staple total for the season to 51,203, down from 59,701 RB a year ago. The seasonΆs all-cotton total of 3,749,810 RB was up 26% from 2,978,644 RB graded a year ago.

Separately, U.S. upland loans outstanding rose by 372,123 RB to 1,001,436 RB during the week ended Monday, the latest USDA figures showed.

Entries were 444,950 RB and repayments were made on 71,927 RB. Upland cotton under loan included 49,154 RB of Form A issued to individual growers and 952,229 RB of Form G issued to marketing cooperatives or loan servicing agents.

Meanwhile, mills priced 797 on-call lots in December last week and producers priced 1,087 lots, according to the latest data from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.

The unpriced positions declined to 20,694 lots on the mill side and to 10,649 lots on the producer side, widening the net call difference by 290 lots to 10,045, which was 6.97% of DecemberΆs declining open interest, up from 6.73% a week earlier.

The unfixed mill position outweighed that of producers by a ratio of 1.94:1, compared with 1.83:1 the week before.

Mills added 877 lots in March, 505 in May, 313 in July and 569 in December 2017, while producers added 50 lots in March, 21 in May, 301 in December 2017 and 176 in March 2018.

Across the board, mills added a net 1,466 lots to boost their unpriced position to 85,551 lots (8.555 million bales), while producers priced a net 583 lots to shave theirs to 24,100 lots.

Futures open interest dropped 488 lots Thursday to 260,254, with DecemberΆs down 2,423 lots to 136,794 and MarchΆs up 1,765 lots to 84,017. Cert stocks grew 2,372 bales to 27,889. There were 3,868 newly certified bales and 1,496 bales decertified.