Cotton futures closed lower on Monday on switch-linked speculative sales and the market could come under further pressure from investors moving positions out of the spot contract in the days ahead, brokers said. New York Board of Trade's open-outcry July cotton contract settled down 0.49 cent at 49.99 cents per lb after dealing between 49.60 and 50.25 cents.
New-crop December dropped 0.58 to 55.85 cents and the rest lost 0.35 to 0.73 cent. IntercontinentalExchange's NYBOT electronic cotton market showed the July contract down 0.53 cent at 49.95 cents at 2:31 pm EDT (1831 GMT). "It's starting the roll (in earnest) and the locals are leaning on it. We're just getting started and should see more (in switch trade)," said Frank Weathersby, an analyst for brokers Affinity Trading in Fort Walton Beach, Florida.
Market players are reducing their exposure to July since deliveries in the contract are due to be posted on June 25. Open interest in July fell 5,079 to 109,259 lots as of June 1. The contract expires on July 9.
Fundamentally, the trade will be waiting for release of the US Agriculture Department's weekly crop progress report to gauge growing conditions across the US cotton belt. A weekly letter by Jim Nunn of Nunn Cotton Co in Brownsville, Tennessee, said the market seems to have paid little attention to recent dry conditions in the south-eastern United States. But Nunn said it is early in the season and "timely rains would cause a quick turnaround" in the area.
Futures sagged from the opening bell due to switch trade and this in turn prompted some of the smaller speculators to sell off the market, dealers said.
Analysts said the market will wait for a pair of key government reports to be handed out this month. One is the US Agricluture Department's monthly supply/demand report on June 11 and the other is the USDA's plantings data on June 29.
Brokers Flanagan Trading Corp put resistance in the July contract at 50.50 and 50.90 cents, with support at 49.25 and 48.70 cents. Floor dealers said final estimated open-outcry volume stood at 14,200 lots versus the prior total volume of 19,840 lots. Screen trade Friday was at 10,416 lots, NYBOT said. Open interest was at 226,882 lots as of June 1, up 3,068 lots from the previous session.