NEW YORK: ICE cotton futures rose on Wednesday on the back of technical buying and gains in global shares market, with the natural fiber on track to post its fourth straight monthly gain.

Cotton contracts for December rose 0.77 cent, or 1.2%, to 66.06 cents per lb, at 12:45 pm EDT (1645 GMT).

The contact has added about 1.4% for the month due to crop damage worries from Hurricane Sally and storm Beta, while it also gained for a second straight quarter, up over 7% so far.

“We are seeing a little bit of repositioning ahead of the end of the month,” said Bailey Thomen, cotton risk management associate with StoneX Group.

“There could also be a little of carry over from equities and other commodities in terms of positive momentum,” Thoman said, adding the ongoing harvest was, however, limiting the upside. The US Department of Agriculture’s weekly crop progress data on Monday showed that 13% of the cotton crop was harvested in the United States as of the week ended Sept. 27, up from 11% in the preceding week.

Total futures market volume fell by 10,312 to 12,155 lots. Data showed total open interest gained 531 to 222,149 contracts in the previous session.—Reuters