The current allocation of volume, open interest, and a lot more cotton futures information, can be found on the ICE futures website under “Featured Reports”.  Volume (viewed above as the green line) is defined as the total daily number of contracts traded in a daily session. The level of volume is often used to gauge the strength of continuing or changing trends. Typical cotton daily volume bounces around between 10,000 and 25,000 contracts.  Through Thursday,  February 6, ICE futures showed above average volumes between 70,756 contracts (on January 31) and 94,064 contracts (on February 3).  The Mar’25 and May’25 contracts had 44% and 34% of the volume, respectively, as of February 6.

Open interest (the red line above) refers to the number of active positions at the end of the day (not double counting both the buyer and seller). Open interest by contract has a similar front month concentration as does volume, e.g., the Mar’25 and May’25 contracts had 39%, and 28% of the open interest, respectively, as of February 6.  Open interest does not fluctuate as much as daily volume, but there are patterns where sharp surges or declines in open interest are associated with sudden rallies or sell-offs, often in high volume.  For the week ending February 6, the day-to-day shifts in open interest in ICE cotton were mixed, i.e., increasing and decreasing from the prior daily level.