Cattle Futures: Choppy Trade Finishes With Gains, Thursday
US - Live cattle futures were choppy on Thursday but settled 15 to 45 cents higher on the day as October cattle lifted to $127.70.
27 September 2013
2 minute read
December cattle closed higher for the 7th day in a row as late buying emerged to spark the bounce with some disappointment from early sellers helping to support.
The market traded as much as 42 points lower on the day into the mid-session with talk of the overbought condition of the market after a six day jump helping to trigger some long liquidation selling.
Short-term cash news seems to be improving but not near the pace of the futures technical action and this added to the long liquidation (profit-taking) selling early today.
Traders expect cash to trade a little higher on the week this week due to a slightly smaller showlist and steady beef prices but trading slightly higher from $124.00-$125.00 last week would still leave futures at a significant premium to cash.
Boxed-beef cut-out values at mid-session today came in at $193.95, up 36 cents from the previous session and up from $193.01 last week.
Beef prices were a bit lower on Wednesday but traders noted that volume of beef traded jumped to 235 loads from 119 on Tuesday. Weekly U.S. beef export sales for the week ending September 19 came in at 9,200 metric tonnes, compared with the prior 4-week average of 18,580.
Cumulative sales for 2013 have reached 605,300 metric tonnes, down -13.8% from last year's pace.
Slaughter came in well below trade expectations at 118,000 head which can sometimes indicate weak demand from the packer.
TheCattleSite News Desk
