KARACHI, Jan 24: Physical business on the cotton market on Thursday was relatively slow as spinners took a technical breather to have apparently an overview of their stock position.

Both spinners and mills have indulged in near-panic buying during the last couple of sessions and have purchased about 50,000 bales during the last three sessions.

However, there is no change in the prices, which seem to have stabilized slightly above Rs1,700 per maund for the southern Punjab lint and and on an average Rs1,600 for the central Sindh lots. Upper Sindh K-68 is selling in line with its Punjab counter part.

Floor brokers said arrivals of phutti into the ginneries were gradually drying up as after having lost all hopes of a rebound in prices, growers are now not inclined to hold on to their positions.

“The quality of phutti deteriorates after stocking it beyond the month of February,” they said, adding “growers tried to clear their stock by the end of January or early February to get a fair price without ginners’ quality claims on various counts”.

Fine type of phutti is getting around Rs800 per 40 kg, while the inferior ones are available below the Rs800 mark, they added.

But reports coming from the ginneries indicate that leading exporters are in direct touch with the ginners of both central Sindh and the southern Punjab and are buying mostly inferior lots against their forward sales.

According to them fine lots of lint are a bit higher than the international parity levels and hence they are in trade at least for the near-term in them.

Moreover, exporters are not inclined to offer themselves as third buyers after the TAP with a view not to stir bullish tendencies in the prevailing market outlook.

Meanwhile, the larger unsold stocks of lint cotton still worry ginners and leading among them are pinning hopes on the rescue operation from the TCP.

Ready offtake was light as till late in the evening about 4,000 bales changed hands, the following being some of the notable deals: 500 bales of Sanghar at Rs1,550, 1,000 bales, Rahimyar Khan at Rs1,700 to Rs1,725 and 500 bales of Sadiqabad at Rs1,700.