NEW YORK: Cotton futures settled marginally firmer Thursday on buying by small speculators as players adjusted their positions before the release of key government data, brokers said.
The market was awaiting Friday's vital US jobs data and looking forward to the key US Agriculture Department monthly supply/demand report the following Friday, Aug. 10.
The benchmark December cotton contract on ICE Futures US rose 0.41 cent to settle at 70.97 cents per lb, dealing from 70.21 to 71.30 cents.
Last Wednesday, the market closed at 69.51 cents in the lowest settlement for the December contract in almost a month, Thomson Reuters data showed.
Volume traded on Thursday amounted to around 9,900 lots, almost three-fourths below the 30-day norm, Thomson Reuters data showed.
"We're waiting for the supply/demand numbers," said Keith Brown, president of commodity firm Keith Brown and Co in Moultrie, Georgia. "We are in limbo."
An early pop in fiber contracts faded into the close, with December seemingly unable to stay permanently above the 40-day moving average at 70.93 cents.
Traders said that while macro factors will continue to hold sway in cotton futures, the focus will be turning to the USDA's supply report because it will be based on actual field surveys and would be the first for the 2012/13 marketing year (August/July).
Open interest, an indicator of investor interest in a market, went up for the third session in a row to stand at 178,021 lots as of August 1, the exchange said.
Volume traded on Wednesday amounted to 15,974 lots, according to ICE Futures data.
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