World Perspectives
livestock

Livestock Slaughter Trends

Livestock slaughter weights have been diverging this year with cattle trending down and hogs trending up.

The heavier slaughter weights for hogs likely stem from packers trying to maintain margins by slowing slaughter rates and leaving them to be finished longer. Year-to-date hog slaughter is up 2.8 percent, but pork production is 3.6 percent higher due to the heavier slaughter weights. If those weight levels continue, pork production over the summer, a period when there is a usual seasonal decline, could maintain the year-to-date expansion pace. In the cattle and beef market, the same pattern of final product growth exceeding slaughter rates is playing out but not as dramatically. This is because cattle size is tailing off from the pea...

Related Articles
feed-grains soy-oilseeds wheat

Export Sales

Export Sales and Shipments for February 20-26, 2026. Wheat: Net sales of 203,100 metric tons (MT) for 2025/2026 were down 16 percent from the previous week and 42 percent from the prior 4-week average. Export shipments of 348,900 MT were down 35 percent from the previous week and 24 percent fro...

feed-grains soy-oilseeds wheat

Market Commentary: Geopolitics, Energy, and Macro Correlations Shape Agricultural Markets

Key Market Developments Markets opened mixed after reports that Iran signaled a willingness to discuss ending the conflict with the United States. Sentiment improved further after President Trump stated that U.S. strikes had significantly degraded Iranian military capabilities and outlined meas...

feed-grains soy-oilseeds wheat

Summary of Futures

May 26 Corn closed at $4.4375/bushel, down $0.0275 from yesterday's close.  May 26 Wheat closed at $5.6825/bushel, down $0.0575 from yesterday's close.  May 26 Soybeans closed at $11.695/bushel, down $0.01 from yesterday's close.  May 26 Soymeal closed at $309.9/short ton, down $...

feed-grains soy-oilseeds wheat

Export Sales

Export Sales and Shipments for February 20-26, 2026. Wheat: Net sales of 203,100 metric tons (MT) for 2025/2026 were down 16 percent from the previous week and 42 percent from the prior 4-week average. Export shipments of 348,900 MT were down 35 percent from the previous week and 24 percent fro...

feed-grains soy-oilseeds wheat

Market Commentary: Geopolitics, Energy, and Macro Correlations Shape Agricultural Markets

Key Market Developments Markets opened mixed after reports that Iran signaled a willingness to discuss ending the conflict with the United States. Sentiment improved further after President Trump stated that U.S. strikes had significantly degraded Iranian military capabilities and outlined meas...

feed-grains soy-oilseeds wheat

Summary of Futures

May 26 Corn closed at $4.4375/bushel, down $0.0275 from yesterday's close.  May 26 Wheat closed at $5.6825/bushel, down $0.0575 from yesterday's close.  May 26 Soybeans closed at $11.695/bushel, down $0.01 from yesterday's close.  May 26 Soymeal closed at $309.9/short ton, down $...

Old World Order; People Not Plants; Tariff Refunds

Old World Order The geopolitical impacts of the war on Iran continue, but Wall Street recovered today, aided by strong employment data. Iran announced a ban on food exports to protect its own food security. The measure will impact sales of saffron, pistachios, dates, and other products. While o...

Image
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.

Search World Perspectives

Sign In to World Perspectives

Don’t have an account yet? Sign Up