KARACHI, Oct 12: Trading activity on the cotton market on Friday was slow in the absence of fresh buying orders from the spinners and mills owing mainly to delivery problems.

Ginners appear to be in an upbeat mood and closely followed the prices trend on the New York Cotton Exchange, although price flare-up there may not have an immediate impact on the local prices, cotton analysts said.

But this perception is shared by the cotton trade that the steep increase in New York March future contract could certainly influence price the world over, they said.

The March settlement at 67.64 cents per lb reflects that there could be a tremendous pressure on world supplies and that could lead to another price flare up above 70 cents per lb level, they added.

Stray lots did change hands on local delivery basis as some of the leading brokers arranged ready delivery from their city godowns to meet the consumption needs of spinners during the Eid holidays, ginners said.

Although some of the local spinners offered to buy stray lots below Rs2,850 per maund with delivery after Eid ginners have raised their asking prices by Rs25 per maund to Rs2,875, floor brokers said.

They said spinners and mills were not inclined to bid above their parity levels at least for the near-term but on the other hand ginners entertain higher price ideas in the backdrop of current steep rise in the New York cotton futures.

Meanwhile, private sector exporters up October 7, 2007 have registered export contracts with the Trade Development Authority totalling 22,066 bales comprising 8,111 bales of previous crop and 13,954 bales of the current crop, out of which 15,799 bales have already been shipped out during the period.

Official spot rates did not show any change and were again quoted at Rs2,825 per maund but some deals in the ready section were done above them.

New York cotton futures suffered modest pruning after having risen sharply higher and were marked down by 0.48 and 0.31 cents per lb at 63.73 and 67.64 for both the ruling December and the forward March contracts respectively.

Mill ready off-take was light totalling about 1,000 bales, the following being some of the

notable deals: 200 bales, each Tando Adam and Shahdadpur

at Rs2,850 and 400 bales, Khanewal at Rs2,875 per maund.