The recent unexpected surge in physical fed cattle prices has created significant discussion about what the beef and cattle price environment will be heading into the new year. It’s no secret that fed cattle supplies remain tight and that the pipeline is low amid the ban on feeder cattle imports from Mexico, both of which are obviously price-supportive factors. Additionally, spot beef demand has surprised to the upside in Q4, which left packers short-bought on cattle over the past two weeks. At the same time, seasonal trends in beef and cattle markets indicate the current strength is unlikely to last, as does existing weakness in parts of the beef market. The big question now is what demand will look like after the holidays and how tha...
What You Need to Know Today: Commodities were mostly lower across the board today after yesterday’s Federal Reserve meeting hinted at a potential interest rate hike later in 2026. The dollar index reached its highest level in over a year, and a strong dollar makes U.S. agricultural expor...
Tomorrow is the Juneteenth federal holiday, and the USDA, along with the rest of the federal government and the CME, will be closed, so the monthly Cattle on Feed report was released a day early. The total number of cattle on feed in feedlots with 1,000 head or more capacity on 1 June amounted...
From WPI Consulting
Communicating importance of value-added products
Facing increasing pressure to quantify the value of export promotion efforts to investors, a U.S. industry organization retained WPI to develop a quantitative model that better communicated the importance of exports. The resulting model concluded that value-added meat exports contributed $0.45 cents per bushel to the price of corn, increasing support for that sector’s financial support of WPI’s client. In addition to serving the red meat industry with this type of analysis, WPI has generated similar deliverables for the U.S. soybean and poultry/egg industries.