Cattle Current Podcast—Oct. 3, 2022

Feeder Cattle futures tanked Friday with pressure from Corn futures surging in response to USDA’s Grain Stocks report Friday (see below).

Corn futures closed 5¢ to 8¢ higher through Jly ’23 and then 2¢ to 3¢ higher.

Feeder Cattle futures closed an average of $2.68 lower.

Live Cattle futures closed an average of 53¢ lower (17¢ to 85¢ lower), except for unchanged in the back contract.

Soybean futures closed 32¢ to 46¢ lower through Aug. ’23 and then mostly 21¢ to 25¢ lower, reacting to softer oil prices and the Grain Stocks report.

Negotiated cash fed cattle trade ranged from mostly inactive with light demand to limited on light demand through Friday afternoon, with too few transactions to trend, according to the Agricultural Marketing Service.

For the week, live prices were steady at $143/cwt. in the Southern Plains and at $144-$145 in Nebraska. Prices were steady to $3 lower in the western Corn Belt at $145. Dressed prices were steady to $1 higher in Nebraska at $228-$233 and at the bottom of last week’s range in the western Corn Belt at $228.

Choice boxed beef cutout value was $2.33 lower Friday afternoon at $243.75/cwt. Select was 35¢ higher at $220.13.

Estimated total cattle slaughter was 3,000 head less week over week at 664,000 head, but was 24,000 head more than the same week last year. Year-to-date estimated total cattle slaughter of 25.36 million head was 385,000 head more (+1.5%) than the same time last year. Estimated total year-to-date beef production of 20.91 billion lbs. was 282 million lbs. more (+1.4%).