By Keith Brown DTN Cotton Correspondent
The cotton market spent Wednesday, as did many other markets, marking time. Thursday, cotton will see another weekly export-sales report and spot March 2019 cotton will expire. Then, on Friday, USDA will issue its latest monthly crop data, and the Labor Department will release its monthly jobs report.
There was some rumored talk on Wednesday indicating that if the U.S./China agreement was not to President Trump’s liking, he would walk away, as he did with the North Koreans. Of course, that is speculation from sources outside of the White House. As it stands, it is reported today by CNBC the U.S./China talks are entering their final stages. Supposedly, there is to be a signing ceremony in late March at the President’s Mar-a-Largo Resort in Florida.
March cotton will expire Thursday. Currently, there is a glaring 2-cent price difference between March and next-in-line May cotton. Thus, if a prominent switch-of-contract gap is left on the continuation chart, traders might see that as a negative development.
The international think-tank group, Cotlook, is projecting a surplus of cotton production of 515,000 metric tons for the 2019-20 season. This compares to a production deficit of 217,000 metric tons for 2018-19 production. Also, the commitment-of-traders report as of Feb. 25, indicating managed money traders were short 24,024 cotton contracts. This was an increase of 2,170 contracts.
For Wednesday, May cotton settled at 74.21 cents, down 0.40 cent, July was 75.22 cents, off 0.23 cent and December cotton closed at 73.56 cents, down 0.16 cent. Wednesday’s estimated volume was 31,000 contracts traded.
