New York cotton rallies

Cotton futures closed with strong gains on Tuesday, more than recovering from the new contract low set on Monday, as cotton rallied with most other commodities in a speculative buying frenzy, traders said.
Sharon Johnson, senior cotton analyst at First Capitol Group in Atlanta, pointed out that Tuesday's action nearly reversed the steep losses of the last 3 sessions.
The New York Board of Trade's July cotton contract ended with 1.61 cent gains at 50.78 cents a lb, after trading between 49.60 and 50.80 cents a lb. On Monday it had fallen to a contract low of 48.75 cents.
New-crop December contract settled 1.60 cents higher at 55.51 cents, up from its 53.55 contract low hit Monday.
Longer-dated cotton contacts closed 1.10 to 1.70 firmer.
Johnson cited a variety of factors for Tuesday's advance, including a selling spree that had run its course, oversold technical factors, and improving fundamentals, along with help from strong gains in most other commodity markets.
"We seem to have exhausted all the selling. By the end of the day (Monday) sellers seemed to have lost interest. Part of that was because cotton was down as much as it has been over the last several weeks," she said.
Commodities generally, "had a rip-roaring close today, and that seemed to add stability to cotton," the analyst added.
Some players may want to get in on the action on Wednesday, especially ahead of Thursday's weekly US crop export report.
In its first estimate for the upcoming 2006/07 marketing year (August/July), the USDA last week pegged world cotton output at 115 million bales, up from 113.41 million bales reaped in the previous season.
Still, the USDA expects 2006/07 world consumption to rise to 122 million bales from 117.2 million bales, boosting sagging fundamentals in the cotton market.
According to Meteorologix, weather forecasts for the US Southeast cotton region called for showers and isolated thunderstorms, with precipitation growing overnight. In the US West and Southwest, mostly dry conditions were seen through Saturday with above normal temperatures.
Floor dealers said trading transpired at a healthy clip on Tuesday after the modest 11,240-lot count on Monday. The exchange reported that open interest fell by 521 lots on Monday to a total of 173,659 contracts.