Market Reports

As expected, September brought bearish pressure on feeder cattle markets with increased supplies of spring-born calves, but this year the arrival of fall was grizzlier than normal with corn prices surging. Early corn harvest yields and silage tonnage have been disappointing and fears that this year’s crop may fall well short of expectations had already surfaced before the USDA began significantly lowering their estimates on the Supply and Demand report issued Sept. 10.

August feeder cattle movement was seasonally light as usual, but marketing calves and yearlings late this summer was especially difficult with extremely high heat and humidity plaguing most of the central portion of the U.S. Dangerously high heat indexes caused tremendous shrink on cattle being moved to market with heat stress sapping flesh and fill conditions and even deathloss in several cases before purchases made their new destinations. Calf demand was only moderate early in August during the hottest portion of the summer, but yearling feeder cattle interest never wavered as feedyard inventories are extremely “green” and buyers continue aggressively for feedlot replacements as the finished cattle market remains brisk.

The following is a summary report of the July cattle supply marketings as reported by USDA Livestock & Grain Market News.

Feeder cattle marketing in July usually starts with a full-week shut-down for the Fourth of July, but this year the industry was not in total agreement on which week to take its break (with Independence Day falling on a Sunday).

Since the announcement in spring that the U.S. would re-evaluate imports of fresh beef from Brazil, it is probably worth taking a look at what we already import from Brazil.