KARACHI, May 20: Trading on the cotton market on Thursday remained insipid as both sellers and buyers kept to the sidelines awaiting new developments on the supply and demand fronts.

But the grand rebound staged by New York cotton futures, notably the ruling July contract did worry spinners as it could lead to a fresh price flare-up in the coming sessions, brokers said.

The New York cotton futures for the ruling July settlement on Wednesday recovered 1.03 cents after two lean sessions on speculative buying at the lower level levels. It ended around 63.97 cents per lb, while the new crop October contracts was marked up by 0.38 cents at 61.50 cents per lb.

"Spinners may have large firm export orders in their kitty but supplies against them are uncertain, both from the local and the foreign sources," spinners say, adding "the most disturbing factor is that prices at which lint is available are terribly erratic never allowing them to plan on long-term basis."

Their concern to honour their export commitments and unsure supply position at competitive rates is well-reflected in the lint import figure of March, which swelled to over 0.352m bales in a single-month, the total so far being 0.970m bales from various sources.

Spinners say the local crop figure is now pretty clear but the supply gap appears to be too big to fill in the backdrop of fluctuating and highly erratic prices.

"We still need about 2m bales to meet our annual consumption needs," claims a leading spinner, adding "out of which about 0.8m bales are available from the local sources and the balance will have to be imported at the sellers price."

Having a fair idea of spinner options, the ginners kept to the sidelines hoping that the spinners and mills have to toe their price line though a bit delayed, dealers said.

An unsold stock of 0.8m bales means that about Rs10bn of the ginners are still tied to them, but they are holding on to their positions for a better price, they said.

Official spot rates were firmly held for the consecutive fourth session in the absence of positive feed back from the ready section where physical business is far below a normal figure. Ready offtake was light totalling about 2,000 bales, the following being an important deal: 600 bales, Haroonabad at Rs2,900.