As we begin the New Year, we get insight from Jim Robb of the Livestock Marketing Information Center. He serves as Executive Director of the group that works with land-grant institutions across the country. He joined Eric Atchinson of Agriculture Today about the momentum seen in the cattle market for much of 2014. Robb sees that continuing in the early days of 2015.
“We actually gained some momentum, we had some winter weather that fed into the story, along with a holiday shortened processing schedule by packers,” Robb said. “We had slaughter down 14 percent year to year. Again, don’t read too much into that in terms of holiday shortened week. Importantly though USDA also reported that dressed steer weights fell rather precipitously in mid - December and we’re down in one week by seven pounds and we are now down to the steer dressed weights that we posted back in mid-September. So we are also getting the seasonal and maybe some weather induced pull back in steer weights, which is probably a bit of a supportive factor in this cattle market too on the fed cattle side.”
Feeder cattle trade was limited for late December as most auction barns shut down for the Christmas holiday. The first taste of those markets for the New Year were reported Monday. The Oklahoma National Stockyards with 6,300 head got pummeled in mid-December with those limit down feeder cattle futures with several days in a row sharply down over $10 a hundred weight. A lot of that has been regained in a single day, compared to mid-December yearling steers were $6 - $10 higher, over 800 pound steers were up to $15 higher and calf trade $5 - $6 higher.
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