NEW YORK, Nov 10: Cotton futures closed mildly lower and near the day’s highs on Friday, with larger-than-expected domestic production figures from a US Agriculture Department’s monthly report taking prices to the session lows, brokers said.

“The US numbers were termed bearish. The world numbers were at least neutral, if not a tad friendly, in that after you do all of the math, world ending stocks did go down 200,000 bales,” said Keith Brown of Keith Brown and Co. in Georgia.

ICE Futures open-outcry December cotton lost 0.05 cent to finish at 64.64 cents per lb, trading 63.95 to 64.70 cents. March fell 0.07 to 69.13 cents. The rest lost from 0.08 to 0.50 cent.

The ICE December electronic cotton contract was up 0.16 cent to 64.85 cents per lb, moving from 64.00 to 64.98 cents.

The USDA’s monthly supply/demand report said 2007-08 US cotton production rose to 18.86 million (480-lb) bales from 18.15 million bales.

“Nobody expected a crop of that size increase,” said Sharon Johnson, cotton expert for First Capitol Group in Atlanta.

Estimates ahead of the report projected the US cotton harvest at around 18.2 to 18.4 million bales.—Reuters