KARACHI, Aug 9: Cotton prices on Tuesday eased further by Rs25 per maund as spinners and mills opted for the new crop, which is available within their export parity levels, brokers said. Apart from quality factors, they said, the fall in prices of old crop is attributed to lower New York cotton futures but on the other hand new crop from the lower Sindh cotton belt is widely accepted by spinners and mills.

The old crop is available at Rs2,300 per maund, while spinners and mills are active buyers for the new crop around Rs2,350 despite the fact that its staple length is short to medium in some cases, some other said.

They said mills buying for the new crop may not be that aggressive as should have been as stock position of spinners and mills was pretty strong after having purchased about 0.09m bales from the TCP in successive weekly auctions.

Prices of new crop may remain stable around the current level of Rs2,350 until lint from the upper Sindh and southern Punjab ginneries starts arriving in the market, they added. Being in a comfortable stock position, spinners and mills may not opt for an aggressive buying in the coming weeks to keep prices within their export parity levels, they said.

But predictions of another record production well above the 15m bales target could trigger panic-selling from the growers and the ginners which in turn could have a negative impact on the prevailing lint price, they said.

Although the supply of the new crop is still modest but is expected to gain momentum during the next couple of weeks as the pace of picking operations of phutti is getting normal, they said.

Official spot rates of the average quality lint were revised downward owing to quality premium, while that of the new crop remained stable around the previous levels. New York cotton futures also ruled weak and shed another 0.38 and 0.48 cents per lb for both ruling October and forward December settlements at 49.42 and 51.25 cents per lb respectively.

Ready off-take was light totalling 400 bales of new crop from Sanghar at Rs2,350 per maund.