KARACHI, July 15: Brisk activity was witnessed on the cotton market on Tuesday as spinners and mills made hectic covering purchases after ginners lowered their prices by Rs100 to Rs150 per maund.

Unlike the previous couple of sessions, when ginners raised their asking prices to Rs4,000 per maund, most of them lowered their selling prices to Rs3,850 to Rs3,900 depending on the quality of lint in trade and found aggressive mill-buying at the lower rates, floor brokers said.

Floor brokers said a sharp pick up in phutti arrivals at the ginneries during the last two days and selling of phutti by the growers at lower prices caused a sympathetic fall in the lint prices.

“The snap fall in prices does not in any way reflects the higher size of the crop,” they said, adding, “Prices do fall and rise during the season on positive and negative news.” But some others said the fresh decline in New York cotton futures followed by reports of higher US new crop projections also caused the fall in local prices as growers were not inclined to hold long unsold position of phutti fearing fresh fall.

Meanwhile, reports reaching here from the major cotton growing areas in the Punjab and lower Sindh cotton belt indicate stray incidents of pest attack but well blow the economic injury level so far and said to be manageable through proper spraying, analysts said.

Well over 10,000 new crop bales changed hands, including some big lots as spinners and mills indulged in panic buying and lifted all the lots, including retail ones at various rates.

The official spot rates were again firmly held at the last level of Rs3,650 per maund but most of the deals in the ready section were done well above them.

New York cotton on the other hand again fell by 70-cent per lb at 69.14 cents per lb, off 1.49 cents for the maturing October contract, while December was marked down by 1.56 cents at 72.03 cents per lb.

Mill ready off-take was on the higher side amounting to well over 10,000 bales, the following being some of the notable deals, which gone through late on Tuesday evening:

Sindh Variety: 200 bales, each Shahdadpur, Sanghar and Tando Adam at Rs3,975.

Punjab Type: 200 bales, Pak Pattan, at Rs3,875, 400, 800 bales, Haroonabad, Chichawatni, at Rs3,850 to 3,900, 1,000 bales, Arifwala at Rs3,900, 200 bales, Gojra, Muridwala, Pir Mahal, Khanewal, Chishtian and Qaboola, at Rs3,900, 1,000 bales, Burewala at Rs3,850 to Rs3,925, 400 bales, Gaggaon at Rs3,875, 600 bales, Sahiwal at Rs3,825 to Rs3,850, 200 bales, each, Bahawalnagar, Depalpur and Mian Channu at Rs3,850.