KARACHI, Sept 21: Trading on the cotton market remained fairly active, spinners and mills continued to lift all the lots offered by the ginners at the lower levels. Cotton analysts said conflicting reports are coming from the Sindh cotton belt about the fall of phutti rates below the official support price of Rs975 per 40 kg.

Some of the tillers who have no holding capacity are reportedly selling their produce around Rs850 and Rs900, which could fall further if the spinners did not come to the rescue of the growers, they said.

However, it is not clear whether or not the TCP will enter the market after ascertaining the reports to ensure a fair price to the growers, they said.

According to ginners they are also worried over the piling of unsold stock of 0.430m bales out of the total arrivals of 0.574m bales up to Sept 15, as spinners are selective buyers.

But there were not many big deals as most of the deals both in Sindh and Punjab varieties were of a retail nature, indicating that mills entertain the idea of fresh fall in prices in the coming weeks after the phutti operations are resumed in the major growing areas of upper Sindh and southern Punjab, brokers said.

The notable feature was that some of the deals both in the central Sindh and Punjab types were done at par but normally the latter is sold at a premium owing to quality considerations.

Ready business was active and amounted to 10,000 bales as under:

SINDH TYPE: 2,000 bales, Shahdadpur at Rs2,150.00, 600 bales, Tando Adam also at this rate, 600 bales, Khipro at 2,100 to 2,110, 600 bales, Mirpurkhas at 2,100, 800 bales, Sarari at 2,145 to 2,150, 400 bales, Tando Adam at 2,080 to 2,085, 200 bales, Shahpur Chakkar at 2,125, 600 bales, Sanghar at 2,100 to 2,120, 200 bales, Nayabad at 2,125 and 400 bales, Nawhabshah at 2,150.