By Keith Brown, DTN Contributing Cotton Analyst 

The cotton market finished two-sided Monday, with the old crop higher and new crop lower. The market actually experienced quite a wild ride Sunday night into Monday morning, with the May contract touching the extended 6-cent limit, before succumbing to lower prices.

In fact, spot May nearly posted an 8-cent range. Possible buyers for the old crop may have been speculators and textile mills. New crop ended lower on improved rain chances for northern Texas and Oklahoma, as well as anticipation for this Thursday’s planting intentions data.

Crude oil fell some 8% Monday amid lockdown in Shanghai prompted fears of a slowdown in demand. Of course, China is the world’s largest oil importer. In addition, another round of possible peace talks between Russia and Ukraine also weighed on energy prices.

This week marks the end of the month and the end of the first quarter, meaning often certain speculators will square up their portfolios. However, traders are anticipating Thursday’s weekly export-sales and USDA planting intentions for 2022 for new price direction for the market.

Monday, May cotton settled at 139.07 cents, up 3.17 cents, July closed at 135.31 cents, up 2.96 cent, and December finished at 111.30 cents, 0.04 cent lower; estimated volume was 64,121 contracts.