Cotton was looking solid on Friday, up 15 to 20 points right out of the gate. The move had some help from crude oil jumping another $5.32 that morning, which tends to give commodities a little boost. Crude closed Thursday up $4.23 to $78.89, and the dollar index ticked back up too at $99.030, so the backdrop was there.

Looking at the USDA export data that came out, it was a mixed picture for US cotton prices. Old crop sales hit 150,362 RB for the week ending 2/26, but that was down 40.62% week-over-week and 9.9% below last year. Vietnam grabbed the most at 50,800 RB, Pakistan took 27,900 RB. New crop had another 54,636 RB sold. The shipments though - those were stronger at 282,155 RB, up 46.19% from the prior week and 5.46% above year-ago levels. That hit a marketing year high, with Vietnam getting 94,600 RB.

On the futures side, March contracts closed Thursday up 87 points at 63.03, May was down 12 points at 64.04, and July down 10 at 66. Seam sales averaged 61.37 cents per pound on 3/4, and the Adjusted World Price got trimmed 40 points to 51.44 cents. ICE certified stocks stayed flat at 129,302 bales. So the US cotton market had some momentum early Friday despite the softer export sales picture.