Cotton futures fell on Thursday, halting three days of gains, on a weak US export sales report ahead of the Easter weekend holiday in the United States. "Historically, speculators are reluctant to hold a long position ahead of a long weekend, particularly given China's history of making market moving announcements, sales, or purchases on holidays and weekends," said Barry Bean, a cotton buyer based in Gideon, Missouri. Cotton trading on ICE Futures US will be closed on Friday for the Good Friday holiday.
Sales of upland cotton totalled 84,400 running bales for the week ended March 17, down 63 percent from the previous week, government data showed. The front-month May contract on ICE Futures US settled down 0.67 cent, or 1.15 percent, at 57.72 cents per lb, after touching a low of 57.33 cents. The contract ended the week up about 0.98 percent.
Industry firm Cotton Outlook (Cotlook) kept unchanged its forecast for global cotton stocks to fall in the current 2015/16 year and 2016/17, as global consumption outpace production. The dollar index was up 0.08 percent. The Thomson Reuters CoreCommodity CRB Index, which tracks 19 commodities, was down 0.61 percent.