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, March 26, ICE cotton futures saw above  average volumes between 52,002 contracts (on March 24) and 95,772 contracts (on March 26). The May’26 and Jul’26 contracts had 41% and 25% of the volume, respectively, as of March 26.

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 May’26 and Jul’26 contracts had 47%, and 27% of the open interest, respectively, as of March 26.  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. Through Thursday, March 26, the shifts in ICE cotton open interest shifted from decreasing to increasing across the week.  In combination with the mixed-to-higher price settlements, this gave the appearance of long liquidation, then short covering, and finally outright new buying.