KARACHI, Nov 6: Brisk trading was again witnessed on the cotton market on Wednesday as spinners and mills covered their positions against forward sales of cotton yarn for the quarter ending Dec 31, 2002.

For the second session in a row a big-lot business was witnessed as spinners and mills remained locked in a battle of nerves to squeeze the floating stock of fine lots from the southern Punjab cotton belt, dealers said.

“Big deals ranging from 3,000 to 5,000 bales finalized in the Punjab variety reflects the prevailing panic among the spinners and the mills and their efforts to grab the floating stock even at the higher rates”, they said.

During the last two sessions, most of the fine lots from the Punjab ginneries are being sold on an average rate of Rs2,150 per maund, indicating further increase in prices if mill demand remained active during the next couple of weeks also.

Earlier in the season, spinners were not inclined to make bigger commitments in the Punjab variety because of high micronaire factor, which now seems to have showed improvement after picking operations got momentum, brokers said.

They said it is satisfying to note that demand for the local textiles is picking up because of lower prices as compared to average world rates and that fact is well-reflected in the near-panic mill buying to cover their forward positions.

Despite higher crop ideas, spinners are not inclined to sit on the sidelines as the prevailing ruling prices are claimed to be in line with their export parity levels, they added.

Meanwhile, reports coming from the cotton belt indicate that phutti prices are stable above Rs900 per 40-kg, the interesting feature being that growers are selling it on daily basis. Even progressive growers are not keeping it on unfix basis for obvious reasons.

Owing to strong mill buying, the official spot rates were upped by Rs25 per maund at Rs2,075, while in the ready section most of the deals were done well above them.

New York cotton futures on the other hand failed to hold on to the overnight higher rates and fell by 1.18 and 1.10 cents per lb at 47.95 and 49.57 cents per lb for both the ruling December and the distant March settlements.

Ready offtake was fairly active as till late in the evening about 15,000 bales changed hands, the following being some of the notable deals as reported by Adil Naseem, a leading cotton broker.

SINDH VARIETY: 500 bales, Sultanabad at Rs1,910, 400 bales, K-68 Tharo Shah at Rs2,075, 1,000 bales, Khairpur at Rs2,075 and 400 bales, at Rs2,100.