Total meat and poultry supplies in the nation’s freezers as of Sep. 30 were down from a month earlier and a year earlier, said the USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service Tuesday in its monthly Cold Storage report.
BEEF STOCKS DIP
Total pounds of beef in cold storage at the end of September came to 464.186 million pounds, down 5.720 million, or 1.22%, from 469.906 million Aug. 31 and down 42.980 million, or 8.46% from 507.166 million on Sep. 30, 2018, NASS said.
Total pounds of boneless beef on ice as of Sep. 30 were 429.351 million pounds, down 4.377 million, or 1.01%, from 433.728 million a month earlier and down 29.553 million, or 6.44%, from 458.904 million a year earlier, NASS said.
The US had 34.835 million pounds of beef cuts in cold storage at the end of September, down 1.343 million, or 3.71%, from 36.178 million at the end of August and down 13.427 million, or 27.8%, from 48.262 million at the end of September 2018, the report said.
PORK STOCKS MIXED
Frozen pork supplies, at 598.899 million pounds, were down 7.879 million, or 1.30%, from 606.778 million a month earlier but up 9.496 million, or 1.61%, from 589.403 million last year, NASS said.
Stocks of the often-watched pork bellies were 40.668 million pounds, down 5.055 million, or 11.1%, from 45.723 million last month but up 10.314 million, or 34.0%, from 30.354 million last year, NASS said.
The total amount of hams in cold storage for this report was 201.712 million pounds, down from 202.454 million a month earlier and down from 214.628 million a year earlier.
Loins in cold storage amounted to 39.622 million pounds, down 5.749 million, or 13.6%, from 42.371 million a month earlier but up 2.859 million, or 8.47%, from 33.763 million a year earlier, NASS said.
Bone-in loin supplies stood at 17.649 million pounds, on Sep. 30, down 2.189 million, or 11.0%, from 19.838 million a month earlier but up 6.519 million, or 58.6%, from 11.130 million a year earlier, the report said.
But boneless loins in cold storage came to 21.973 million pounds, down 560,000, or 2.49%, from 22.533 million a month earlier and down 660,000, or 2.92%, from 22.633 million a year earlier, NASS said.
POULTRY SUPPLIES DOWN
Total supplies of frozen poultry on Sep. 30 were 1.447 billion pounds, down 1% from 1.459 billion a month earlier and down 5% from 1.526 billion a year earlier.
However, total stocks of chicken were 914.971 million pounds, up 2% from the previous month but down 4% from 958.003 million last year, and total turkey supplies were 528.258 million pounds down 6% from 562.402 million last month and down 6% from 564.746 million last year.
CATTLE, BEEF RECAP
Cash cattle changed hands last week at $108 to $112 per cwt on a live basis, steady to up $3 from the previous week, while dressed-basis trading was at $173 to $175, up $1 to $3.
The USDA choice cutout Tuesday was up $0.80 per cwt at $220.93, while select was up $3.64 at $198.08. The choice/select spread narrowed to $22.85 from $25.69 with 82 loads of fabricated product sold into the spot market.
Three heifer and 15 steer contracts were tendered for delivery Tuesday, along with 18 heifer and 11 steer retenders at 1 and 10 steer retenders at 2. There also were 10 steer reclaims at 2.
The CME Feeder Cattle index for the seven days ended Monday was $144.93 per cwt, down $1.03 from the previous day. This compares with Tuesday’s Oct contract settlement of $143.70, up $0.27.