The US government on Wednesday lowered its forecast for cotton inventory in the United States for the upcoming season to below expectations due to a lower-than-expected crop as drought ravages Texas, the country's biggest producing state. In one of its most bullish monthly cotton reports in years, the US Department of Agriculture cut its forecast for the US carryover by 400,000 bales to 2.6 million 480-lb bales, lowered its crop forecast and increased its price forecasts for the upcoming 2013/14

A shortage of wool and a softer exchange rate have pushed wool prices up another notch at this week's North Island sale. The exporter, New Zealand Wool Services International, says there was strong demand for about 7,500 bales on offer. The drought, followed by wet weather that's disrupted shearing in the South Island, have reduced the anticipated amount of wool coming forward for auction. Prices picked up another one to four percent on last week. The next auction, at the end of June, wi

World industrial production growth slightly increased in the first quarter of 2013 after a continuous decline since the second quarter of 2010. Despite this break from a nearly three-year downward trend, the prospect of recovery remains fragile for the majority of industrialized and emerging industrial economies. The base of the current growth is limited to the United States and China only, the world’s leading manufacturers. While the sustained growth of industrialized economies has been jeopa

Prada Spring 2013 Campaign | Source: Prada Prada SpA, the Italian luxury-goods maker, fell the most in almost 12 months in Hong Kong trading after reporting first-quarter profit growth that decelerated to the slowest pace in at least a year. Prada dropped 6.6 percent, headed for the biggest drop since June 21, to HK$68.40 as of 10:01 a.m., compared with a 3.2 percent decline in the city’s benchmark Hang Seng Index. Net income rose 14 percent to 138.2 million euros ($184 million) in the thr

Spanish fashion retailer Mango has closed a quite profitable year, seeing its full year net profit jumped by 79 percent. Profit after tax in 2012 amounted to 113.4 million euros, with 84 percent of turnover coming from foreign markets and 16 percent corresponding to the domestic market. Mango closed 2012 with a turnover of 1,691 million euros, 20 percent more than in the previous year. As explained in a corporate note, Mango relates the good figures to the changes implemented during the first h

Swedish fashion chain H&M has announced that its next designer collaboration will be with Parisian designer Isabel Marant. The collection, set to roll out across 250 H&M stores worldwide and online in November, will feature apparel and accessories for women and for the first time Marant will create a collection for men. Marant, known for her effortless style and influential take on Parisian chic by mixing urban attitude, boho elegance and rock ‘n’ roll spirit, will be creating a wardrob

Following the expansion of the SVHC Candidate List to include 54 new substances, taking the total number of products, including DecaBDE, to 138 on December 19, 2013, SGS has provided an updated SVHC Screen Lite Programme that helps fulfilling the REACH SVHC requirements for textile and footwear products. In order to assist the industry, experts in the SGS technical competence centre have developed a robust and cost effective SVHC screening programme targeting high risk SVHCs. The high ri

US textile and apparel imports during April recovered from a slowdown in March, rising by 15.6%, to 4.39 billion square metre equivalents (SME), virtually on a par with the level recorded in April 2012 (see accompanying table). Cumulative imports during the first four months of the year rose to 17.34 billion SME, which was 4.0% higher than the comparable figure in 2012. That growth was driven primarily by increased shipments of apparel, which rose by 6.55% versus a year earlier. Textile impo

Once bitten, twice shy. Recent disputes between Indian apparel makers and private equity (PE) investors are making the latter more cautious of investments in the segment. PE investors are taking a harder look across all levels of the market, in the backdrop of recent tussles such as SAIF Partners versus Catmoss Retail, now before the Delhi High Court. SAIF, which holds 49 per cent stake in Catmoss, had alleged the latter mishandled Rs 115 crore of PE investment and also of raising money withou

Vietnam’s garment and textile export volumes to the U.S. and the European Union have increased from earlier in the year but unit prices have sharply declined. Data released by the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Office of Textiles and Apparel (OTEXA) showed that China took the lead for apparel exports to the U.S. in the first quarter with revenue of US$8.7 billion, followed by Vietnam US$2 billion, India US$1.6 billion, Indonesia US$1.4 billion and Bangladesh US$1.3 billion. Vietnam posted t