Market Trends with Tracy

Waiting for Beef Relief

BEEF Beef harvest rebounded last week up to 548K head, compared to the prior week of 484K head. Still running well behind last year. With continually larger animals being

Grains in an October Slide

BEEF Last week’s beef harvest was 484K head, seems like a holiday shortened week but it was not. Prior week was 529K head; this is keeping inventories tight.  The pattern

A Little Bit of Everything in Dairy

BEEF We will start with a little good news. The Santa Teresa, New Mexico border crossing for live cattle reopened today and so far, no issues. The next border crossing wi

Belly Bargain

BEEF The tight inventories coupled with good demand is slowing this market decline. Continuing to be exempt from market declines, middle meats being led higher by ribeyes

Stubborn Steaks

BEEF We are in a post-Labor Day declining market. The exception is no one seems to have told strip loins and ribeyes. Pretty much everything in the beef complex is moving

Did You Hear the Pork Market Crash?

BEEF Last week imports of live cattle from Mexico resumed from one port of entry in Arizona. That was “paused” on Tuesday this week for equipment malfunctions.  Everyone

Beef Moving Up, Up, Up

BEEF Let's start with a little good news. On Monday, the border in Arizona was opened for beef cattle. Monday had 716 head presented for inspection. 692 were approve

A Pricey Ride to Labor Day

BEEF This beef market is pushing higher still. I’m still expecting a market correction after Labor Day, but man, getting to Labor Day is not going to be cheap. Beef harve

The Block is Hot

BEEF: Last week’s harvest was 59K head. I thought the prior week of 512K was low, so let's take another step down, with packers keeping pressure on availability with

Hopeful Beef Outlook

BEEF: I’m going to start with the weekly beef harvest.  Last week’s total was 512K head; the prior week was 528K head.  I don’t recall this small a weekly harvest on a no

Good News in Beef

BEEF Let’s start with some really good news. For the first time since 2018 the US cattle herd increased by 200K head to 94.2 million head, this however is not the start o

Chicken is the New Beef

BEEF The beef market is continuing lower this week though I do see some slowing in the declines. Production continues restrained with 525K harvested last week, down from

The Pork Belly Race is On

BEEF The beef market continues its summer pull back. Overall market tone is moving lower. I expect we will see this through the end of the month; come August we’ll be sta

Soy in Action

BEEF As expected, beef pricing for middle meats is moving lower. Strips, ribeyes and tenderloins all coming off a bit from pre-holiday highs. I expect we will see this co

The Summer of the Pork Belly

BEEF Beef production last week was 537K head, up from 526K the week prior. We are still in that zone of keeping supplies tight to keep pricing up. The animals that are pr

The Dog Days of Summer

BEEF We hit Independence Day next weekend and the start of the “dog days of summer." Once we get clear of the holiday I do expect we will see a market reset, especially o

The Need for Beef

BEEF We’ll start again with the New World screwworm. We now have 6 confirmed cases in Texas and 1 in New Mexico. Affected animals are a dog, a goat and 5 cattle. While ou

Pressure on the Herd

BEEF Let's start with the bad news. We’ve been expecting this to happen for several months, yesterday the USDA announced the discovery of the New World Screw Worm in

Stay Ahead of Your Needs

BEEF I’ve been saying for weeks to stay ahead of your needs, and I’m going to reiterate, stay ahead of your needs, as demand does seem to be ticking up a bit. Weekly harv

Summer Grilling Had Me a Blast

BEEF We are rolling into the summer demand for things that go on the grill. The most common will be burgers, and I do think we will see burgers to continue higher every w