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October 2019 saw strong domestic and export demand for beef.
Markets, News, Prime cuts

Beef demand should remain strong

Prime Cuts with Steve Kay

By
How much consumers pay for beef and how much they buy largely determines the success of the North American beef industry. Beef demand at home and abroad was strong last year across the continent and should remain so in 2020. Much of the reason is that the U.S. and Canadian economies are among the strongest […] Read more
Strong demand has made beef the protein of choice for most American consumers.
Markets, News, Prime cuts

Rising tide raises all boats

Prime Cuts with Steve Kay

By
The old saying that a rising tide raises all boats is especially apt in the U.S. beef industry right now. Stronger than expected domestic beef demand has raised cash live cattle prices above their levels of the week of Tyson Foods’ Holcomb, Kansas, fire on August 9. Live prices, based on USDA’s five-area region, averaged […] Read more
Pork only provides competition for beef purchases with consumers when it's low in price.
Markets, News, Prime cuts

Beef faces plethora of pork in the marketplace

Prime Cuts with Steve Kay

By
Pork, pork and more pork. That’s what the U.S. beef market faces as it moves into the middle of the last quarter of 2019. American pork processors are harvesting live hogs at a record rate and putting more pork onto the market than ever before. Only strong pork exports (accounting for 27 per cent of […] Read more
China’s hog losses due to African swine fever now represent 38.7 per cent of its total hog inventory.
Markets, News, Prime cuts

China has a protein crisis

Prime Cuts with Steve Kay

By
You can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear, goes the old Scottish idiom. But you can if it is a Chinese sow. This is because African swine fever (ASF) has reduced China’s sow population by 37 per cent in just the past year. China’s hog losses due to ASF are rapidly mounting […] Read more
Live cattle futures prices plummeted in the week after Tyson plant fire.
Markets, News, Prime cuts

Tyson Foods fire creates ripple effect in cattle markets

Prime Cuts with Steve Kay

By
The North American cattle and beef industry has endured “weather” and BSE-related markets but never a “fire” market such as resulted from the fire at Tyson Foods’ Holcomb, Kansas plant on August 9. The fire took out more than 30,000 head per week of capacity for several months. The loss is most directly having an […] Read more
Adverse weather has had an impact on the U.S. fed cattle market in 2019.
Markets, News, Prime cuts

Beef prices weather the weather

Prime Cuts with Steve Kay

By
The U.S. beef market is proving to be remarkably resilient this year. Summer heat has finally given way to cooler weather. But beef demand held up remarkably well in the heat and domestic demand in July was actually better than last year. Now the market has the Labor Day holiday behind it, which usually boosts […] Read more
The U.S. meat and livestock industry has a comprehensive price reporting system that is the envy of the world.
Markets, News, Prime cuts

Kay: Price reporting invaluable to livestock and meat industries

Prime Cuts with Steve Kay

By
Good market information, particularly regarding prices, is the lifeblood of the livestock and meat industry, in which millions of dollars change hands every day of the week. “Good” information, however, must be accurate and unbiased, as comprehensive as possible, timely and easily accessible, and understood by all market participants. Today’s cattle producers throughout Canada can […] Read more
A plunging futures market in mid-May caused hedged cattle feeders to sell cattle early at lower prices for three weeks in a row.
Markets, News, Prime cuts

Kay: Cattle futures crush the present

Prime Cuts with Steve Kay

By
Futures markets perform an important role in agricultural markets by allowing producers of key commodities to construct risk management strategies to help them make money. The futures are also anticipatory markets, and these two roles sometimes make for strange bedfellows. Right now in the U.S., the futures market for feeder and live cattle are crushing […] Read more
A variety of factors produced record profits for all processors of fed cattle last year.
Markets, News, Prime cuts

Beef packers enjoy purple profit patch

Prime Cuts with Steve Kay

By
North American beef processors are enjoying an extended period of profits that is unprecedented in the industry’s history. Packers on both sides of the border are seeing margins that would have been unthinkable five years ago. U.S. packers racked up record profits in 2017, surpassed them in 2018 and are on track for more records […] Read more
Marfrig increased its presence in the United States by acquiring a majority stake in Iowa Premium Beef last March.
Markets, News, Prime cuts

Brazilians increase U.S. beef industry presence

Prime Cuts with Steve Kay

By
Brazilian beef behemoth JBS SA sent shockwaves through the U.S. beef industry nearly 12 years ago when it announced it was acquiring Swift and Company, the third-largest beef processor in the U.S. and the largest in Australia, for US$1.4 billion. Little did the industry know that Brazil’s second-largest beef company would eventually buy into the […] Read more

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