ICE cotton futures jumped over 3 percent on Wednesday and hit a near five-month high on expectations of improvement in demand for the natural fibre and on an easing dollar. The March cotton contract on ICE Futures US touched a session high of 74.23 cents per lb, a price not seen since August 9. It closed with the biggest one-day percentage gain for the commodity since September 1.
"The view for global demand has improved a lot. People are also seeing a higher than expected demand from China," said Gabriel Crivorot, analyst at Societe Generale in New York. "Certified stocks in US are pretty low as compared to what they were a couple of weeks ago and as a reaction to that funds that already have large net long positions are buying a bit more," he added.
The dollar fell against the euro and yen on Wednesday, backing off a 14-year high against a basket of currencies with investors cautious about increasing bets on the greenback without fresh clues on the US economy and the timing of interest rate increases. March cotton contract on ICE Futures US settled up 2.3 cent, or 3.20 percent, the biggest one-day percentage gain since September 1. It traded within a range of 71.57 and 74.23 cents a lb.
Total futures market volume rose by 32,700 to 53,885 lots. Data showed total open interest gained 1,846 to 247,158 contracts in the previous session. The dollar index was down 0.60 percent. The Thomson Reuters CoreCommodity CRB Index, which tracks 19 commodities, was up 1.49 percent. Certificated cotton stocks deliverable as of January 3, 2017 totalled 40,470 480-lb bales, unchanged from the previous session.