Latest / Professional Ag Marketing Podcast / Technical Warnings in Cattle | Cattle Market Talk April 10th, 2026

Transcript

Technical Warnings in Cattle | Cattle Market Talk April 10th, 2026 · Professional Ag Marketing Podcast

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the Cattle Talk Podcast.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_00: Your weekly breakdown of cattle market fundamentals, key news, and the insight escaping the industry, creating commodity futures, and options involved substantial risk of luck, and is not suitable for all investors.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_01: Jace, it's Friday.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_01: It's the Masters, and I have you sitting here talking with the podcast about cattle.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_01: How's it going?
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_01: It's going good.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_01: Well, something else doing very good right now is the cattle market.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna have Cade pull up a little bit of a futures chart here on the cattle market.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_01: It's been a heck of a run that we've had here lately.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_01: Let's start with the fat cattle here on the June.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_01: You can see we've had a really nice uptrend lately.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_01: That light line that's just below this little uptrend that we've had is a 10-day moving average.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_01: We've really been holding our own.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_01: Not many corrections lower at all yet.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_01: New highs on the move.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, some fantastic levels, Jace, that we've had.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_01: So really nice run higher here.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_01: Technically, I would say we're getting pretty overdone.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, the RSI, stochastics, um, a lot of different indicators getting well in the overbought category here, as you can see on the bottom there.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_01: So uh some really good futures advancement on uh on the live cattle side of things.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: On the feeder cattle side, a very similar chart as well.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_01: Uh you know, we've seen some very nice uh progression higher.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_01: We're we're getting into a to an overbought status there too, uh, keeping an uptrend really nice, not quite back to uh contract highs there, but we're kind of working on it from this point.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_01: So, what do you got to say about some of the activity we've had lately just on the futures?
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it's been really strong.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_02: And I think I think a bit of what we're seeing is you know last year, last year the trend higher started about now, a little earlier than now.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_02: And I think we're I think we're trying to aim for the same sort of thing there.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_02: Um, at contract highs is very, very impressive.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_02: Um, feeders aren't quite back to contract highs, so you've kind of got a little bit of a push-pull going on.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_02: The fats pulled it higher when they were trying to reach that gap.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_02: They filled the gap.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_02: Feeders weren't quite to it.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_02: Live cattle got above the contract highs, and now you've got feeders in the gap.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_02: So you've kind of you've kind of got a push-pull mechanism working there.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_01: A little bit.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_01: It's been some uh some really nice activity, though.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_01: We've held a really nice uptrend.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_01: We uh it doesn't seem to be pulling back too much at all.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_01: Real no real strong uh corrections here to say the least.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_01: But what do you want to start with today?
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_01: Let's talk about just crush opportunities, how you think we're sitting right now uh with the Versa Index.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so it's it's better now than it was, say, four weeks ago or so when you're placing cattle.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_02: It's still not incredible.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_02: You know, you're you're able to place a break-even.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_02: That's basically what it amounts to, maybe a dollar winner or something.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_02: But that has improved significantly over the past few weeks.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_02: It was it was expensive for a while there.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_02: It was very expensive, and yeah, cattle that didn't work, but we're finally seeing that start to straighten out a little bit.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_01: How about on the uh the beef production side?
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_01: Just start on the supply side.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_01: What do you see from numbers right now?
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_01: Imports, weights.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_01: Tell me a little bit of the supply side of the picture.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so I don't want to just throw a bunch of numbers at you, but like we're we're 94% or so of year ago numbers on beef production.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_02: So we're we're running below year-ago there.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_02: Weights are higher again.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_02: They've kind of found a new plateau, if you will.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and we're just we're importing about 18% of our production right now.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_02: So importing a lot of beef, but it's just hard to keep up with the production being as low as it is now.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, for the past three years, it kind of hung in the same area.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_02: Weights made up for it, cow kill made up for it, and we're those two are just kind of dwindling, and there's not much juice to squeeze out of that that side of it.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_02: So production's down, and in turn, cattle numbers are because cattle numbers are down.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_01: And it looks like at this point, uh uh Packers, producers, looks like the producers get a little bit of margin back in his pocket, uh, a little bit more leverage here, it looks like, as of late.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, what can you tell me about the cash market and some of the implications that the the numbers have had on that?
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so we had Lexington closed down last November.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and we were very concerned about that just from a shackle space availability standpoint.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_02: But I think I think that's easing now just with how short of numbers we are, and that's becoming evident.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_02: Like we're able to cash rallied what eight dollars last week, six to eight dollars last week on uh with a plant being down and JBS still kind of on strike there in Greeley.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_02: And what's the status on Greeley now?
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_02: I think that strike's over with, so they should be returning to normal here soon.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_02: Nice.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_02: But yeah, we we've just the the producers got a lot of leverage back, and the Packer had positive margins for a little bit there, and it just seemed like they kind of couldn't resist buying cattle, you know, at a time that it that it worked.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_02: So we've been strong again this week, right?
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_02: 250 or so?
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, there's been 250 paid by some smaller regionals in the north here so far.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_02: Not a lot of trade yet.
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_01: What can you tell me about the uh the demand side of the category?
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_02: So demand's been softer now, and that's a a relative term from where we've been.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_02: Um we're still trending higher than where we were last year, but we have seen a a stronger dip in the in the cutout.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_02: So like last year, about this time, we had a dip, um, and then kind of came back from it and roared to record highs on the on the cutout there aside from COVID.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_02: But um this year it's been a much more pronounced regression there.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_02: So we've we've seen it, we've seen it come back quite a bit more.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_02: And like the the middle cuts, like the stakes haven't been performing quite what they should or what we feel they should for where the for the market is.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_02: We're kind of getting that made up for in the in the ground meat, and that's maybe a dangerous place to live.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_01: Very much so.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_01: Um just on the demand category here, continuing to work off of that.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_01: Uh uh, let's look at U.S.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_01: consumer sentiment a little bit.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_01: We fell to a record low in early April.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, it looks like one-year inflation expectations, they jumped up to about 4.8%.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, long-term expectations rose to 3.4%.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_01: Basically, just gas being above four bucks a gallon.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_01: There, that's eroding much of the purchasing power that we've got going on today.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, fuel energy makes up about half of the inflation gauge when we track that.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_01: So it uh when you want to talk about what really moves uh the inflation numbers, gas has a large part to do with that.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_01: So uh looking at some of these consumers, it it looks to be weakening a little bit on consumer sentiment.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_01: And some of these other categories, just you can tell that uh folks are getting a little bit worried about uh spending a little bit too much money here coming forward.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_01: So at some point the beef market's likely to care about that, but still running at pretty decent levels here.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_01: Cutout as well doesn't seem to be uh influenced too much at this point by a US consumer that might be getting a little bit scared.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, absolutely.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_02: And like you you'd take$30 more out of their check each each week for gas.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, that just makes it makes a big difference, and it's you're starting to see it.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_02: For sure.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_01: Any other final thoughts on the cattle market here for this week's cattle podcast?
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it's been really strong here, and it's it's really encouraged us to get some more coverage on.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_02: We had cattle that we were worried about break-evens, and we're we're above above break-evens on a lot of the cattle that were bought earlier this year.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_02: And so I think we're we're getting some a decent amount of coverage on at these levels just to just to protect us from a change in the in the cutout or the demand side of it more than more than the supply.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_02: The supply is tight.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_02: We know that.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_02: But the risks are still there, you know, border, border opening, you've got a plant closure, possibly, you know, there's just those risks are still there.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_02: So we're we're getting we're getting coverage, John.
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_01: Well, thank you for joining us today, Jace.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks for tuning in today.
• 8:43
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• 8:51
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