KARACHI, April 19: Cotton market on Tuesday lacked normal trading interest as buyers remained conspicuous by their absence after the TCP floated a tender for the sale of 60,000 bales. “The TCP tender scheduled for April 23, seems to have taken life out of already cheerless market sending shock waves among the ginners who still hold an unsold stock of 0.326m bales,” brokers said.

Unlike the previous seasons, both local spinners and mills and foreign buyers are allowed to participate in the bidding and the highest bidders are expected to be accommodated.

New York cotton futures on Monday were quoted around 52.78 and 53.84 cents per lb, up 0.72 and 0.70 cents for both the ruling May and the forward July contracts respectively.

Owing to low quality and micronaire, the local lint is generally sold to foreign buyers at a discount of five cents per lb but the TCP reserves the right to accept or reject any bid, market sources said.

The TCP having cost factors in mind has allowed the Punjab spinners and mills to lift the commodity from its upcountry godowns and quantity has already been specified, the sources said.

But some of the leading ginners who hold bulk of the unsold stock were a bit worried and hope that the spinners would be back in the market after the euphoria associated with the TCP tender fades.

“There is no problem to sell this meagre stock of fine lots,” they said, adding “the important thing is post-tender price at which some of the bids are accepted”.

Ginners hope higher tender prices will be reflected in the local lint during the post-tender sessions and they could well be one of the chief beneficiary of TCP sales.

There was no change in the official spot rates in the absence of mill demand, which were firmly held at Rs2,225 per maund.

Ready off-take was nil as spinners and mills remained busy in preparing tender papers to be submitted to the TCP well in time.