November 09, 2006	Thursday	Shawwal 16, 1427

KARACHI, Nov 8: Steadier conditions prevailed on the cotton market on Wednesday as spinners and mills continued to build-up long positions at the prevailing prices. Bulk of the ready off-take again remained confined to the Punjab variety owing to its fine quality and staple length, floor brokers said. The notable feature was that most of the deals were finalised at a uniform rate of Rs2,450 per maund.

Reports from central Sindh ginneries were also fairly encouraging where prices remained stable around the previous level of around Rs2,400 for better quality.

Floor brokers said the upper Sindh K-68 Sawgin variety, which matches its counterpart in the southern Punjab cotton both in terms of stable length, was not listed in the physical business officially.

The K-68 sawgin areas comprised Khairpur, Gothki, Mirpur Mathelo, Dharki, Pano Aqil and some other areas but so far not a single deal was reported in it despite the fact that ginning operations were resumed with the southern Punjab ginneries, they added.Some ginners from those areas said operations were resumed a bit late and most of the ginneries were busy in ginning out fine quality lots for higher grade of cotton yarn.

But some brokers claimed that in the absence of sale data from the upper Sindh ginners their daily turnover figure was not being added to KCA ready business transaction list.

Official spot rates were again firmly held at the last levels but deals were done well above them.

New York cotton futures on the other hand turned mixed. While the ruling December settlement fell by 0.03 cents, March rose by 0.12 cents at 49.89 and 54.07 cents per lb respectively.

However, the market remained steady amid large ready off-take totalling about 40,000 bales including some big lots. The following are some of the notable deals.

SINDH VARIETY: 1,000 bales, Mirpurkhas at Rs2,350, 3,000 bales, Shahdadpur at Rs2,375 to Rs2,385, 1,000 bales, Tando Adam ,2,000 bales each Sanghar and Nawabshah at Rs2,350 to Rs2,375 and 1,000 bales, Hyderabad at Rs2,350 to Rs2,360.

PUNJAB TYPE: 1,200 bales, Hasilpur, 3,000 bales, Ahmadpur East, 2,000 bales, Jalalpur, 2,000 bales, Rajanpur, 1,200 bales, Bahawalpur, 1,200 bales, Yazman, 1,000 bales, Uch Sharif, 1,400 bales each Rahimyar Khan, D.G. Khan and Chinigoth at Rs2,450, 1,300 bales, Khanpur at Rs2,440 and 1,000 bales, Bahakhar at Rs2,400.