Hogs were down about 10 cents from the daily low, with losses ranging from 7 to 32 cents. In Tuesday’s trading, futures initially rose on the grim cold storage numbers, rising as much as $1.05 at a high. April ended the day as an outlier, rising 42 cents. The USDA national average base hog price fell 54 cents to $80.63. The CME Leanhog Index fell 11 cents to $83.48.
The USDA will release its quarterly hog and swine report on Thursday afternoon. Traders expect a contraction in the breeding stock category, with estimates ranging from 95.2% to 98% year-on-year. This was offset by increased productivity, with the estimated number of pigs per litter increasing by 3.4% over last year. Market hog and all hog numbers are the same or slightly higher than last year.
NASS reported February pork stocks were the tightest since 1997. According to the cold storage report, bulk inventory in February was 63.8 million pounds.
The USDA national pork carcass cutout price fell 41 cents to $95.33. USDA estimates the number of FI hogs slaughtered for the week at 974,000. That compares to 972,000 head last week and 965,000 head in the same week last year.
April 24th: The Hogs closed at $85.575, up $0.425.
On May 24, the Hogs closed $0.175 lower at $91.750.
April 24th Pork Cutout rose $0.000 to end at $93.950.
On the date of publication, Alan Brugler did not have (directly or indirectly) any positions in the securities mentioned in this article. All information and data in this article is for informational purposes only. For more information, please see his Barchart Disclosure Policy here.
