Fourth-quarter farm income and agricultural credit conditions improved significantly across major portions of the US, said Economists Cortney Cowley and Ty Kreitman of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, in a Bank release Wednesday. Despite the ongoing pandemic, prices for several key agricultural commodities increased sharply in the final months of the year, the … Read More

Farmers continue to report strong current conditions on their farms, according to the February Purdue University/CME Group Ag Economy Barometer. James Mintert, Purdue University Agricultural Economist, wrote in a release on the survey that while the overall reading for the Ag Economy Barometer changed very little compared with January, down two percentage points to a … Read More

A look at wholesale beef prices shows that grocers probably are preparing for the spring grilling season early this year. Primal carcass cuts that can be cut into grill-sized products are moving up in price with many showing earlier-than-normal gains.   RIBEYS SHOW EARLY GAINS   Weekly boneless light wholesale ribeye prices last week were … Read More

Large commodity investment firms, known as managed money, trimmed their collective net long live cattle futures position in the week ended Tuesday, as hedgers cut their net short position. The data came from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission’s weekly Commitments of Traders report Friday.   FUNDS PARE CATTLE POSITION   Managed money’s new combined net … Read More

2-26-21 – In 2020, the US exported $7.6 billion in beef and variety meat products (down 6% from 2019); variety meat exports accounted for 11.8% of this, down from 12.4% in 2019, said Brenda Boetel, agricultural economist at the University of Wisconsin-River Falls, in a Livestock Marketing Information Center letter to Extension agents called In … Read More

Estimated margins for fed cattle sold by unhedged cattle feeders last week were down slightly from the previous week but still were positive, according to Sterling Marketing Inc’s Beef Profit Tracker, published by the Farm Journal’s AgWeb. Estimated packer margins remained very high.   FEEDING MARGINS POSITIVE   The calculated feeding margin for cattle sold … Read More

Total red meat supplies in US freezers on Jan. 31 were up about 3% from a month earlier but down about 12% from last year, the USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service said in its monthly Cold Storage report Tuesday. Beef stocks were down about 3% from the previous month but up about 6% from last … Read More