July 01, 2008	Tuesday	Jamadi-us-Sani 26, 1429

KARACHI, June 30: The new crop prices on Monday were quoted higher as some of the ginners from the central Punjab cotton belt offered modest lots for ready delivery which were readily picked up by the spinners.

Floor brokers said ginners appeared to be in a commanding position owing to short supplies, but the interesting thing was that they had already forced spinners and mills to toe their price line at least for the near-term.

“Spinners are willing to buy new crop lint at Rs3,900 per maund indicating that prices are heading to set fresh highs above Rs4,000 per maund irrespective of the crop size,” they said.

According to market sources the phutti arrivals in the central Punjab cotton belt are fairly steady as growers willing sellers at Rs1,800 per 40 kg as more ginning factories have resumed operations. Currently, about a dozen ginning factories are operating and expectations are that supply position will further improve in couple of days.

Unlike the previous season, Sindh ginners are a bit late because of delayed sowing owing to water crisis. However, floor brokers said phutti picking had already resumed in some of the areas and local ginneries are expected to resume operations next week.

Previously, Punjab ginners were used to resume operations after having purchased phutti from the lower Sindh growers as the picking operations there were resumed a bit early, market sources said. They said some of the leading ginners still have an unsold stock of 15,000-20,000 bales of the current crop, but the last session of the outgoing 2007-08 witnessed bullish trend in prices of both the current and new crop for the first time.

However, ginners said mill buying for both current and new crop would go side-by-side, although there may a difference in prices based on quantity.

Official spot rates for the new crop were again held unchanged at Rs3,750, but the new crop was traded a bit higher though on a modest scale.

The following deals were finalised on Monday in the new crop in Punjab type: 200 bales, Burewala at Rs3,900 and 100 bales, Arifwala at Rs3,800.