CME: Choppy Trading Pushes Close Contracts Lower, Tuesday
US - A choppy trading day saw October live cattle close 60 cents lower at $126.20 with December and February also posting losses, although smaller on Tuesday.October cattle closed sharply lower on the day and pushed down to the lowest level since August 7th. December cattle closed lower on the day and followed the nearby futures, write analysts at CME.
The market saw choppy to higher trade early today as strength in the stock market and weakness in corn may have helped provide support.
Sharply higher trade in soybeans and corn had feeder cattle under some pressure early today but the turn from higher to lower in corn helped to support moderately higher trade in feeder cattle with November feeders closing higher for the 5th session in a row.
Cash news is quiet but the outlook for tightening supply into the 4th quarter has helped to rationalize the premium structure of the market. Beef prices were hardly changed on Friday.
The COT reports as of August 27th showed Non-Commercial and Nonreportable (large and small specs) combined traders held a net long position of 54,929 contracts, up 2,104 contracts for the week and the buying trend is seen as a short-term positive force.
Boxed-beef cut-out values at mid-session came in at $196.05, up 38 cents on the day and up from $195.80 last week at this time.
CME analysts report that slaughter came in higher than trade expectations at 124,000 head.
TheCattleSite News Desk