May 9, 2012

US cattle prices have weathered the recent announcement of another BSE case, with June's live cattle futures contract ending the week at US$115.37 per hundredweight, up by US$2.52 from last Friday.

Ron PlainThe August contract settled at $118.50 per hundredweight, up US$2.95 for the week. The October fed cattle contract ended the week at $123.8 per hundredweight, up US$3.08 compared to the week before. December fed cattle settled at $127.15 per hundredweight.

August feeder cattle closed the week US$6.05 higher than last Friday at US$158.10 per hundredweight.

USDA says 53% of corn acreage had been planted by April 29. That compares to an average of 27% planted on that date, and 12% planted on April 29, 2011. USDA is predicting that 2012 corn acreage will be the most since 1937. A big drop in cash corn prices is expected this fall. May corn futures gained 9 cents this week to end at US$6.62 per bushel. December corn futures are trading US$1.38 a dollar per bushel under May futures.

The beef cutout value was a bit lower this week. The choice boxed beef carcass cutout value was US$190.20 per hundredweight, down 45 cents from the previous Friday. The select carcass cutout was down 93 cents from the previous week to US$186.31 per hundred pounds of carcass weight.

Fed cattle prices were mixed this week. Through Thursday, the 5-area average price for slaughter steers sold on a live weight basis was US$120.16 per hundredweight, up 37 cents from last week and up US$5.07 per hundredweight from the same weeklast year. Steer prices on a dressed basis averaged US$190.90 per hundredweight this week, down US$2.79 from a week ago, but up US$6.80 from a year ago. Packer margins are improving. Last week, steer dressed prices were US$3.04 per hundredweight above the choice cut-out value. This week the price spread is only 70 cents per hundredweight.

This week's cattle slaughter totalled 623,000 head, up 2.0% from the week before, but down 5.5% from a year ago. The average dressed weight for slaughter steers for the week ending on April 21 was 835 pounds, down 2 pounds from the week before, up 20 pounds from a year ago, and above a year earlier for the 15th consecutive week. Year-to-date beef production is up down 3.3%.

Oklahoma City feeder cattle prices were mostly US$2 to US$8 lower this week.