KARACHI, Oct 6: Cotton market on Saturday resisted fresh decline as spinners and mills remained active buyers at the prevailing rates amid a briskly traded weekend session.
But unlike the previous sessions, central Sindh lint was sold at discount of Rs25 to Rs50 per maund as compared to its southern Punjab counterpart, which was sold around Rs2,900 per maund.
Southern Punjab lint is known for its quality and is mostly considered contamination-free and used to produce higher counts of cotton yarn for exports and local consumption by the ancillary industry, market sources said.Most of the ginneries in the southern Punjab are by now in full operations and lint is available from there but at bit higher rate of Rs2,900 per maund as compared to prevailing average rate of Rs2,850, they added.
Although there is no immediate negative impact of steep decline in the New York cotton futures on the local lint, analysts predict it will be visible during the next couple of sessions, they said.
The market trend currently is led by the supply and demand factors and any fresh decline in New York cotton futures below 60 cents per lb will make import competitive, some spinners said.
Meanwhile, local spinners have imported about 50,000 tons of lint from various sources including fine types for blending purposes to produce higher counts of cotton yarn and fabrics, or about 0.250m bales during the month of August 2007, according to official figures.
New York cotton futures shed another 0.27 cents per lb for both the ruling October and the distant December contracts at 60.22 and 63.22 cents respectively, having fallen from the peak of 66 cents during the last about two weeks.
But on the other hand official spot rates were firmly held unchanged at the last level of Rs2,850 per maund.
Mill off-take was on the higher side and amounted to about 15,000 bales as under:
SINDH TYPE: 1,000 bales, Shahdadpur at Rs2,860 to Rs2,870, 600 bales, Tando Adam at Rs2,860 to Rs2,875, 600 bales, Mirpurkhas at Rs2,825 and 800 and 400 bales, Nawabshah and Khipro at Rs2,850.
PUNJAB VARIETY: 400 bales, each Rahimyar Khan and Sadiqabad and 200 bales each Layyah, Fazal Pur and D.G. Khan at Rs2,900, 600 bales, Burewala at Rs2,840 to Rs2,890, 400 bales, each Sahiwal, Mong Bangalow and Garma Raja and 200 bales, Pakpattan at Rs2,875, 1,000 bales, Hasilpur at Rs2,850 to Rs2,855 and 200 bales, Haroonabad at Rs2,865.