DTN Closing Cotton            09/23 13:38

   Cotton Awaits "Motivation" 

   Cotton remains sluggish as trade optimism, harvest pressure and strong macro 
data collide.


Keith Brown
DTN Contributing Cotton Analyst

   The cotton market continued in its sideways-to-sluggish trend Wednesday. On 
one hand, traders are hoping for some big export positives to come out of the 
Trump/Xi meeting, and on the other, the seasonal hand of harvest is beginning 
to take effect. 

   Today's S&P Global PMI jumped to 58.7% for September, the highest level in 
nearly five years. The previous August number was 56.5%. Mathematically, the 
report underscores that U.S. businesses continue to boom. The number rallied 
the U.S. Dollar and jumped the yields on ten -year to a 19-year high. 

   As mentioned, the long-awaited Trump/Xi trade meeting will take place in 
Washington tomorrow. The two leaders will discuss, among many topics, tariffs, 
trade, AI, Iran, and Taiwan. 

   Also on Thursday, the USDA will issue its weekly exports-sales. Highlights 
from last week included combined seasonal sales of 77,391 bales, versus the 
previous total of 76,318 bales sold. For last year, those combined sales were 
186,100 bales. Weekly Shipments totaled 142,076 bales, down from the previous 
177,774 bales exported. 

   On Friday, at 3:30 p.m. EDT, the CFTC will update its Commitments of Traders 
data. Last week's numbers showed that the managed-money traders were net 
sellers of 2,267 contracts. That action reduced their net long carry to 97,903. 
Their record stands at 108,788 contracts. 

   For closing Wednesday, December closed at 8289, up 2 points, March 2027 
finished at 8565, plus 8 points, and July 2027 settled at 8753, 19 points 
higher. Today's estimated volume was 35,528 contracts.

   Keith Brown can be reached at commodityconsults@gmail.com




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