March 27, 2003	Thursday	Muharram 23, 1424

KARACHI, March 26: Cotton market on Wednesday maintained a firm outlook as ginners held on to their unsold positions anticipating further increase in prices.

Spinners on the other hand are making abortive efforts to outwit ginners on the price front but the perceptions of a short crop did not allow ginners to lower their asking prices, brokers said.

However, some of them holding unsold stock of inferior lots are selling them above Rs2,500 per maund, no one among them is willing to part with their fine lots below Rs2,650 or possibly Rs2,700 per maund, they added.

The market is, therefore, facing the problem of low daily volumes as both the buyers and the sellers are firmly sticking to their positions apparently awaiting the final crop figures due possibly by first week of the next month.

Floor brokers said while the lower Sindh ginners and some of the central cotton belt have sold bulk of their stocks ahead of the arrival of new crop by early July, bulk of the unsold stocks are being held by the upper Sindh and southern Punjab ginners.

The general thinking among them is that lint prices could rise further partly because of a short crop and partly to problems created by the Iraq war and its likely impact on the world prices and stand-off on the export front, they said.

Already, some of the traditional partners of the local spinners are reluctant to open fresh Letters of Credit (LCs), which could well mean piling of unsold stocks of cotton yarn and in turn liquidity problems.

Meanwhile, leading spinners who had already signed import contracts for about half million bales of lint from various sources anticipating local crop shortfall have accelerated the pace of physical shipments to replenish their stock position.

According to official sources 0.405m bales of lint cotton has already arrived in the godowns of spinners since Sept 1, 2002 to March 23, 2003, which also included 16,569 bales arrived during the last week.

Official spot rates stood firm at the previous level but New York cotton futures showed a modest rise of 0.14 and 0.16 cents per lb at 57.45 and 58.41 for both the ruling May and the distant July settlements respectively.

Ready offtake was light totalling about 4,000 bales, all from the Punjab ginneries, the following being some of the notable deals: 1,000 bales, Haroonabad at Rs2,650, 800 bales at Rs2,700, 250 bales, Yazman at Rs2,575 and 400 bales, Sadiqabad at Rs2,600.