Cotton futures were initially called to open 20 higher before bouncing to 40 higher on the opening.
Good fund buying was again noted on the open, with a cautious offer coming out of the commercials.
Trade did become a scale up seller around 55.20 and this ensued that the 55.25 level again was too tough an obstacle to clear.
In very similar trade to yesterday though, much of the mid session chopped around the unchanged level, with bearish options activity having puched the market back to it's low at 54.85.
This tight range continued throughout the day, with light activity prevailing and the 55.10 level acting as further resistance later in the session.
Spread trading was fairly inactive, with the Dec / March switch tracking around the 100 level. Options activity was also fairly sparse, with very little high delta trading taking place. Calendar put spreading was notable between May and July and July and December.
In the end the pseudo holiday session ended with gains of 22 and 25 in March and May and small losses in the back months. Estimated volume was modest at just 6,862 lots.
This morning's spec hedge report was as expected with the specs having reduced their short position from 6 percent net short last week to 2 percent net long this week.
For the week new longs increased some 5,600 lots whilst a further 8,300 shorts were liquidated.
The spec shirt peaked at 17.4 percent or 28,492 net contracts in late November, and now it remains to be seen how much of a long they are about to put together. Yet another consolidating session for the March contract today.
marketing@alchempro.com
