KARACHI: The cotton market lacked trading interest on Wednesday after a long closure on account of Ashura as spinners stayed away from the buying arena.

According to market sources phutti (seed-cotton) picking remained suspended during the holidays pushing up prices on strong demand from ginners.

The Karachi Cotton Association (KCA), however, kept its spot rates were unchanged at Rs8,100 per maund.

The prices of Punjab and Sindh phutti varieties were quoted higher between Rs3,600 to Rs4,000 and Balochistan at Rs3,900 to Rs4,000 per 40kg due to short supply, brokers said.

With higher phutti arrivals into the ginning factories will improve availability of cotton in coming days, they anticipated. Prem Chand Khyatani, a ginner from Sindh who is also a grower, told Dawn that recent rains have extensively damaged the crop in lower Sindh and this will ultimately impact quality and quantity of the crop.

Due to short supply the prices of quality lint may soar and this will be disturbing situation for the textile industry who has to compete in the world market, he maintained.

The world leading cotton markets gave mixed trend with New York cotton gained for all the future contracts. The Indian and Chinese markets closed mixed to easy.

No transaction was reported to have materialised on the ready counter.

Published in Dawn, September 12th, 2019