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Cattle On Feed · Professional Ag Marketing Podcast

• 0:01
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome to the Professional Ag Marketing Podcast.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_01: If you want a deep dive into the ag markets and risk management strategies, your search is over.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_01: Come here after every Friday to get your weekly commodity recap.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_01: Trading commodity futures and options involves substantial risk of loss and is not suitable for all investors.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_01: This is your host, Mike Minor.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_01: Let's get started.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_01: Today is February 21st.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_01: I've got Nick Bork with us here today.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_01: How's it going, Nick?
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_01: Good.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks for having me, Mike.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_01: Awesome.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_01: Well, we're going to talk about cattle and feed here in just a few moments that just came out about an hour ago.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_01: So that'll be fun to kind of process that.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_01: And then we're also going to just start with talking about a few of these markets in general here.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_01: So big volatility week.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_01: A lot of markets had a tough time determining what direction to go in.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_01: But for the most part, here, after a hot start to a lot of these egg commodities, after our long three-day weekend, we did uh did take a few steps back here the last three days.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: You know, corn, both livestock markets really tried to work their way lower throughout most of the week here, Nick, and kind of fought their way back to the bottom end a lot of these uptrends that we've been going in.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_01: And corn, let's start there.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_01: Uh uh, we uh we had a fantastic week in the corn market here.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we had corn futures finish a little lower after after hitting some 18-month highs in the corn futures here.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_01: So a big week in corn.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we've been getting a lot of a lot of help with uh a lower US dollar recently.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_01: I think that helped a lot.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_01: And uh a few different things there with inflation concerns, but going into the weekend, it sounded like we were talking more about some really large U.S.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_01: planning uh numbers for acres and then whatever potential that the USDA is going to look at this next week uh with the egg outlook report coming out, they're gonna give us a little glimpse of what that 25-26 balance sheet could look like.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_01: Either way, uh a few big numbers probably coming out for production on the corn side going forward.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_01: So a little bit of concern going into the weekend on that.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_01: Stock market was down awfully hard uh to end our week as well.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, equities here, SP down over 100 points, closing out our week here.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_01: A little bit of Trump trade, it looks like some concerns there, it really looks like uh that's a pretty big move for the equity markets, just in case anyone's wondering there.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_01: So um a few things, consumer optimism, maybe not looking the best right now.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_01: Uh uh we'll keep an eye on that.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_01: As money flow has definitely been an issue and a major market mover here lately, Nick.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_01: But what what did you see this week uh out of the Catalon feed report and any big talking points uh for that one?
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_00: Well, not a lot of big talking points, I don't think, Mike.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, we get this report every month, and it seems like this Catalon feed report lately has not been really moving and shaking the market like it like it has in the past.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_00: I think uh, you know, just just for over the past year really, I mean, producers really have had the leverage when you look at the big picture side of things, and and so um you know the cattle market has had a sell-off here in the last couple weeks, I think, partly driven by what these boxes are doing.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_00: Um you know, they're they're off their highs here for the year, still extremely high nonetheless, but but um you know it's it's it's you just gotta wonder there a little bit.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: Are we are we actually losing some demand or is this just seasonal, right?
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, but as far as the cattle on feeder port goes, I mean it maybe was slightly bullish, you know, um uh slightly less cattle on feed or excuse me, slightly more cattle on feed than than what was um in the estimate there.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um also the placements and marketings there were slightly slightly less there for the for the month of uh of January.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_00: But either way, I think the big story in cattle right now is is is our box is gonna drop um hard enough here that that Packers gotta continue to to drop these bids because they're they're struggling to procure the cattle anyway, let alone with the lower cash market.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_00: The only thing that's really moving these cattle right now is bases.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_00: And um and so they may have to, you know, they may have to drop bids uh quite a bit here if if boxes want to continue on their slide.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_01: Well, that'll be one going forward.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_01: I know prices fell this week kind of as the cash market declined here to a couple bucks.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_01: Uh slaughter's been incredibly low for a full week slaughter here, it looks like, compared to the last several years.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_01: Um yeah, so as we've got choice going down, as we've got slaughter going down, if if you see that long enough, it's probably gonna be a concern, won't it?
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_01: But at this point, from today's catalog feed numbers, uh no real major concerns, at least from a marketing perspective, probably gonna be a struggle to get the market to trade it on Monday again, isn't it?
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think you're right.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: I think you're right, Mike.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: It'll be it'll probably be uh, you know, a a slight back and forth there on Monday, but um the real story, I guess, is the is the current inventory.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_00: Interestingly, though, like as you look at this uh this January data starting out 25 here, though, we we actually have about a million more cattle on feed than what we did like in in this stage of the cycle um back in like 2015.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_00: So it's really interesting, you know, we got a lot more cattle on feed, yet even with a lower cow herd, and um, but we and we continue to import a lot of beef too.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_00: So so uh all that's you know putting a lot of beef on the market, and we have sky-high choice beef, so just a true testament.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_00: You know, 2025 here is continuing with a true testament of of beef demand.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_01: Well, thank you for your time today, Nick.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_01: Uh a few awesome talking points.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_01: Not a whole lot to really uh dive into on the Catalan feed report, at least.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, but that's not always a bad thing either, is it?
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_00: For sure.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_01: All right, well, thank you for your time today, Nick.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_01: And thank you to all our listeners.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_01: Please reach out to us at professional eggmarketing.com.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_01: Check out our other podcast as well, Professional Egg Marketing, that's released every Friday.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_01: Trading commodity futures and options involves substantial risk of loss and is not suitable for all investors.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_01: See you next time.