Feeder Cattle futures firmed Thursday, closing an average of 87¢ higher, except for 27¢ lower in expiring Apr. They were helped along by the mainly narrowly mixed close in Corn futures.
The overall continued decline in wholesale beef prices and weaker weekly exports helped pressure Live Cattle Live futures an average of 47¢ lower, except for unchanged in almost-spent spot Apr.
Choice Boxed beef cutout value was 69¢ higher Thursday afternoon at $262.60/cwt. Select was $1.26 lower at $251.06.
Negotiated cash fed cattle trade ranged from a standstill to mostly inactive, with too few transactions too trend, according to the Agricultural Marketing Service.
So far this week, live prices are steady in the Southern Plains at $140/cwt.; steady to $1 higher in the Northern Plains at $144-$146 and in the Western Corn Belt at $145-$147. Dressed prices are $2 higher at $232.
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Major U.S. financial indices surged Thursday, fueled by tech stocks and positive quarterly corporate earnings reports. That was despite news from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) that real gross domestic product (GDP) decreased at an annual rate of 1.4% in the first quarter of this year, according to the advance estimate. In the fourth quarter, real GDP increased 6.9%.
According to BEA, the decline reflected decreases in private inventory investment, exports, federal government spending, and state and local government spending, while imports, which are a subtraction in the calculation of GDP, increased.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed 614 points higher. The S&P 500 closed 103 points higher. The NASDAQ was up 382 points.
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The Creighton University Rural Mainstreet Index (RMI) declined to 62.0 in April from 65.4 a month earlier but remained above growth-neutral for the 17th consecutive month. The RMI results from a monthly survey of bank CEOs in rural areas of a 10-state region dependent on agriculture and/or energy.
“The region recorded a 34% gain in farm commodity prices over the past 12 months, but low short-term interest rates and healthy farm income have underpinned the Rural Mainstreet Economy,” says Ernie Goss, the Jack A. MacAllister Chair in Regional Economics at Creighton University’s Heifer College of Business.
Among highlights from the latest survey:
The region’s farmland price index for April climbed 2 points to 80.0, marking the 19th straight month the index was above growth neutral. For the past several months, the RMI survey registered the strongest, most consistent growth in farmland prices since the survey was launched in 2006.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, along with accompanying global trade tensions and surging inflation, pushed the business confidence index to its lowest level since the beginning of the pandemic in Spring 2020. The index, which reflects bank CEO expectations for the economy six months out, plummeted to 39.1 from 54.0 in March.
This month bankers were asked to forecast the impact of President Biden’s emergency waiver on the summer production of E-15 ethanol. Fewer than 4 of 10 bankers (39.1%) expect President Biden’s emergency waiver on the summer production of E-15 ethanol to have a positive impact. More than half (56.5%) expect the waiver to have little or no impact.