KARACHI, Dec 30: Cotton market on Thursday remained in a bullish frame of mind as ginners further raised their asking prices but spinners and mills remained active buyers at the rise.

Official spot rates were further upped for the fourth consecutive session by Rs20 per maund, although most of the deals in the ready section were finalized well above them.

"War for quality lots appears to be at its peak as both the leading textile groups and the TCP are trying to grab the fine lots at the ginners asking prices", brokers said adding "spinners appear to be in no mood to be outwitted on the price front and are matching their buying offers most on cash basis to those of the TCP".

Most of the ginners still prefer to sell to the spinners at slightly lower rates as compared to offered by the TCP apparently for quick payments without any procedural formalities to which they have to complete after dealing with the official agency, they said.

Big-lot business in upper Sindh fine lots reflected that spinners and mills were in no mood to leave the field open for the TCP and making for-ward purchases to cover their foreign sales.

For the third session in a row, a big deal of 8,000 bales is being credited into the account of spinners around Rs2,000 per maund as spinners are not inclined to miss even a single lot of higher-mic badly needed for their export outlets, market sources said.

Meanwhile, TCP is close to hit the high procurement mark of 2.4m bales, mostly of quality lint, although there is no official word whether or not the central bank has raised its fund allocation from the existing Rs23bn to Rs35bn as reportedly demanded by its high-ups.

Reports from the world markets including New York Cotton Exchange were a bit bearish on speculative selling caused by reports of oversupply in the major producer countries.

New York cotton futures shed in part the overnight gains, off 0.19 and 0.28 cents for both the ruling March and the distant May contracts at 44.01 and 44.38 cents per lb respectively. Ready off-take was active totalling over 20,000 bales, the following being some of the notable deals:

SINDH TYPE: 400 bales, Mirpurkhas at Rs1,625, 800 bales, Sanghar at Rs1,700 to Rs1,750, 400 bales, Nawabshah at Rs1,825, and 8,000 bales, upper Sindh at Rs2,000.