Cotton prices remain firm with strong demand for quality cotton on Wednesday at cotton market. Buyers were keen to build up stock but they were equally not ready to pay extra price for the lint. Whereas, sellers on their part knowing about the shortage of quality cotton wanted to fully exploit the situation.

Both sellers and buyers tried to turn the situation in their favour. Nevertheless, needy spinners managed to finalize some deals at high rates as they were not ready to take risk due to rising cotton prices in most of the world markets.

The world cotton markets by and large remained firm, with the New York cotton market closing with fresh gains. However, the Indian cotton market remained easy as phutti arrivals gained momentum on reports of larger sized crop.

The market was also eagerly waiting for phutti (seed cotton) arrivals report due in the next couple of days.

The Karachi Cotton Association kept it spot rates unchanged.

Major deals changed hands on the ready counter were: 1,200 bales from Saleh Pat at Rs6,500, 440 bales from Rohri at Rs6,775, 514 bales from Chichawatni at Rs6,500, 2,000 bales from Haroonabad at Rs6,650 to Rs6,850, 800 bales from Fort Abbas at Rs6,750 to Rs6,775, 1,200 bales from Yazman Mandi at Rs6,850 to Rs7,000, 400 bales from Shujabad at Rs6,900, 2,000 bales from Rahimyar Khan at Rs7,000 and 961 bales from Mian Channu at Rs7,000.

According to cotton analyst Naseem Usman, if Indian cotton prices come down further, there would be a possibility that Pakistani spinners would once again try to make an attempt to get cheaper cotton from across the border.