Cash cattle prices consolidate
SASKATOON (Staff) – After opening quietly following respective July holidays in Canada and the United States, slaughter cattle prices and trade picked up on both sides of the border.
In Alberta, about 15,000 more head of fed cattle were sent to market. Prices were $2 per hundredweight better than they were early in the week and averaged about $1 per cwt better in the week-on-week comparison. Trade on July 7 saw prices for steers and heifers top out at $81.75.
Meanwhile, feedlots in Kansas, Nebraska and the Texas/Oklahoma panhandle sold most of the cattle off their showlists, helping to keep the market current and buoy prices by as much as $2 (U.S.) by the end of the week. Prices were consistently hitting $62 (U.S.) per cwt.
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The August futures contract is now trading at a premium to the cash market, causing some feedlots to forward sell cattle, temporarily taking them out of the system.
Eventually, those cattle will need to be sold and Canfax reported the bounce in cash prices may only be temporary.
Canfax reports the cow market is holding its own on tight supplies and good demand from packers. D1 and D2 cows traded between $54-$65 with sales to $67.85.
Demand is good for feeders but supplies, true to the seasonal trend, are tight, Canfax reports.
More pigs push prices down
Hog producers across the Prairies sent more animals to market after the short Canada holiday week and average Index 100 prices were down across the board: by $3 per hundred kilograms in Saskatchewan, by $2.76 per ckg in Manitoba and by $1.20 per ckg in Alberta.
