Isn’t wonderful how much liquidity we have in the futures market? Now instead of cattle dropping or jumping $1.50 a day they can move $3.00! And so much of that movement is done by companies or hedge funds that don’t know one end of a cow from the other and have no vested interest in them!
These market swings are nice if they going up and you happen to wait a week because of this or that, but they’re sure not very nice if a person is on the wrong side of the move! It’s hard to believe that the very same cattle can be worth $100.00 a head more, or less, than they were just seven days earlier! Yet that seems to be how feeder cattle get bought.
It’s interesting how a few pounds or a few days can make such a difference. Cattle weighing over a certain weight have no value one day, and then everybody wants them. It seems okay to price cattle in the country 50 pounds lighter and then get a slide, but it sure is funny how telling the true weight makes them un-merchantable.
The grazing this spring sure seems to have been outstanding! Lots of cattle continue to show up and weigh up pretty good. The market has been strong all the way through with hardly any weakness showing! It will be very interesting to see how many cattle are left to sell the after first of June, barring a drought.
Politics and common sense don’t seem to share much in common. There is a lot of talk about saving money, but yet millions are spent just to travel and advertise. It would be hard to imagine what would happen if the American people spent money like the government and politicians do!
The cattle inventory in the United States by most measures is down from where it was. Herd build up does not appear to be in full swing, although the cow slaughter is lower, there are more heifers being bred than the last several years, and many places got some much needed rain. Of course, summer isn’t officially here yet, so there sure needs to be some more rain to make things work out.
Beef demand seems to be holding up although folks aren’t eating quite as much. With carcass weights as big as they are, herd buildup isn’t as big an issue. Summer time is just around the corner, wheat harvest has already started along the red river, and the market is started on its way up again! We have a fantastic market despite everything! Take advantage of it!
Buy some cows! Raise some beef! Get in the action at the auction!
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