USA: Cattle market review for week 47 from November 27, 2023

Technical selling accelerated the decline after funds recently liquidated long positions, traders said.

"We don't know what demand will be a year from now," said Arlan Suderman, chief commodities economist at broker StoneX. "Funds don't want to take on that kind of risk by holding positions until we figure it out."

CME February live cattle futures fell 4.300 cents to settle at 170.975 cents a pound. The January feeder cattle contract fell 7.8 cents to close at 219.325 cents a pound. Both contracts set their lowest prices since March 27.

Markets came under pressure after the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) said in a report released after the close of trading Wednesday that total pounds of beef in U.S. freezers as of Oct. 31 rose 5.6% from the previous month.

October beef inventories have increased an average of 2.5% over the past five years, according to Steiner Consulting Group. Analysts say the larger-than-usual increase last month suggests slowing beef sales are causing more of it to remain in refrigerators.

U.S. export demand has weakened this year due to a stronger dollar and rising beef prices due to tight cattle supplies . Beef export sales for the week ended Nov. 16 totaled 10,000 metric tons for 2023, down 30% from the previous four-week average, the USDA reported Friday.

At the same time, expectations for early 2024 deliveries increased after the USDA reported in some recent monthly reports that producers placed more cattle in feedlots than a year earlier. Supplies are expected to decline by the end of next year.

WEEKLY COST OF CUTTINGS CAT.CHOICE

CATTLE SALES

Sale of livestock, heads

Average weight

Week 46

Week 47

Weekly growth,%

Week 46

Week 47

Weekly growth,%

Bulls (live weight)

17,940

9 708

-45.9%

1 468

1 426

-2.9%

Heifers (live weight)

7 213

4,957

-31.3%

1 316

1 308

-0.6%

Steers (slaughter weight)

7 345

5,853

-20.3%

978

986

0.8%

Heifers (slaughter weight)

2 120

2,094

-1.2%

834

841

0.8%

WEEKLY WEIGHTED AVERAGE PRICE OF CALLS

BEEF PRODUCTION

Index

Week 47

Previous week

A year ago

Weekly growth,%

Growth over the year, %

Slaughter volume

538,000

636,000

589,000

-15.4%

-8.7%

Live weight

1 382

1 380

1 392

0.1%

-0.7%

Slaughter weight

835

834

842

0.1%

-0.8%

Beef production (million pounds)

447.9

529.2

495.0

-15.4%

-9.5%

CME: Live Cattle Futures

Week 46

Week 47

Weekly growth,%

December

175.75

170.25

-3.1%

February

176.80

170.98

-3.3%

April

178.43

173.30

-2.9%

Feeder cattle futures

January

227.38

219.33

-3.5%

March

234.50

222.73

-5.0%

April

234.50

226.68

-3.3%

You can find out more about the state of the cattle market in the USA (livestock prices, the cost of beef by category, production dynamics) in the weekly reviews of the meat market in Russia and in the world from Meatinfo.ru. Weekly reviews are available for free as part of a subscription to monthly meat analytics Russian markets.