Cotton takes early hit from slowdown Mounting evidence of a global slowdown is hitting cotton harder than many other commodities, with futures retreating on Monday to the lowest point since late 2009. Cotton markets tumbled after record-high prices last year led farmers to expand production and prompted the clothing industry to use more polyester. Now cooling economies in China and India, the world's biggest and second-biggest textile centres, have prompted a new sell-off as traders eye weaker volumes up and down cotton's long supply chain. "When things go south, cotton moves first," said Ron Lawson at Logic Advisors, a commodities broker. There are so many things that affect cotton prices that are built into the economy - it's a great barometer of what's going to happen. When you see cotton get sick, everything else tends to show up at the hospital weeks or months later. Cotton has declined 21 per cent since the beginning of May, outpacing the 12 per cent fall in the Reuters-Jefferies CRB commodities index. In New York, ICE July cotton fell as much as 3.6 per cent to 66.10 cents a pound, the lowest price for a front-month contract since November 2009. Cotton is down 71 per cent from last year's peak of $2.27 a pound. The International Cotton Advisory Committee, an intergovernmental group in Washington, last week forecast cotton stocks would rise in the coming year, reaching the equivalent of 61 per cent of global consumption by July 2013. This would be the highest ratio of stocks to use since 1999. "We're looking at a massive carry-out next year," said Lou Barbera, a soft commodities broker with ICAP. News of rain in Texas, the US's leading cotton-producing area , had also depressed prices, brokers said.