ICE cotton futures inched down on Friday in thin volume, due to lack of clarity in the US-China trade negotiations, sending the natural fiber down for a fifth straight month.

Cotton contracts for December settled down 0.17 cent, or 0.29 per cent, at 58.83 cents per lb. It traded within a range of 58.46 and 59.3 cents a lb. Prices have fallen nearly 8 per cent this month.

“"Cotton is falling because of lack of interest and trade (US-China negotiations) is not going anywhere,” said Sid Love, commodity trading adviser at Kansas-based Sid Love Consulting. “The trade war scenario is causing a lot of uncertainty and that is keeping speculative traders out,” Love said.

Prices had dropped to a 3-1/2 year low earlier this week and have declined nearly 20 per cent so far this year as the US-China trade war hurts demand. Recent rains in Texas, a major crop-producing state, are giving a boost to crop conditions previously impacted by extreme heat, traders said.