Chicago | Reuters — U.S. cattle and hog futures markets fell on Monday, following a broad-based commodity sell-off in the absence of any fresh bullish news, traders said.
“It is just kind of risk-off trade,” said Matthew Wiegand, broker at FuturesOne. “Livestock was for the most part happy to follow along.”
Chicago Mercantile Exchange October live cattle futures settled down 0.65 cent at 106.7 cents/lb. and December dropped 1.25 cents to end at 110.6 cents, hitting its lowest since Sept. 10 (all figures US$).
CME October feeder cattle settled down 0.175 cent at 142.25 cents/lb.
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Chicago soybeans rose further on Friday to a two-month peak as brisk weekly exports, hopes that China will revert to buying U.S. crops and a rally in soyoil offset supply pressure from favorable U.S. field conditions.
CME October lean hog futures settled down 0.9 cent at 65.6 cents/lb. and most-active December hogs ended down 1.975 cents at 61.55 cents/lb.
Traders were closely monitoring an outbreak of African swine fever in Germany. A further seven cases of African swine fever were confirmed in wild boar in the eastern German state of Brandenburg, bringing the total confirmed cases to 20 since the first one on Sept. 10.
A massive outbreak in China, the world’s biggest pork producer, has led to hundreds of millions of pigs being culled.
— Reporting for Reuters by Mark Weinraub in Chicago.
