KARACHI, July 29: Cotton market on Thursday lacked normal trading interest in the absence of strong demand both from the spinners and the mills. Stray lots of both the current and the new crop did change hands around the previous rates but despite persistent revision for the last couple of sessions, official spot rates are still being quoted Rs25 per maund higher as compared to those at which physical business is being transacted.

Floor brokers said the continued absence of the spinners from the market reflects that the prevailing lint prices are still a bit higher against their export parity levels both for cotton yarn and cloth.

International prices of both cotton yarn and cloth have fallen sharply lower in line with the New York cotton futures and it is pretty difficult for the spinners and the mills to sell their end-products after buying lint at the current levels.

Moreover, most of the spinners and mills are facing liquidity problems as stocks of unsold cotton yarn are piling in their mills in the absence of normal exports, they said.

"Some of the foreign importers of cotton yarn are not opening letters of credit against the confirmed orders for the next quarter ending Sept 30, and demanding downward revision of agreed prices," claims a spinners adding as a result "physical shipments are being held up."

He said physical activity on the cotton market will improve only after sanity returns to the export sector of the end- products. Meanwhile, reports coming from the lower Sindh and the central Punjab cotton belts indicate that the picking operations are in full swing because of clear weather.

Owing to extremely hot weather in the entire cotton belt there are no reports of pest attack as the heat kills pests before they cause damage to the standing crop, market sources said.

For the fourth session in a row, official spot rates were marked down by Rs25, the total decline during the last four sessions being Rs100. After having received massive battering during the last couple of sessions, New York cotton futures also recovered modestly by 0.51 and 0.29 cents per lb at 44.45 and 44.81 cents per lb for both the ruling October and the forward December contracts respectively.

Ready offtake was modest as till late in the evening about 1,000 bales changed hands, the following being some of the notable deals;

NEW CROP: 100 bales, Mirpurkhas at Rs2,400.