Selling cattle where the best price is available may see you target a store sale rather than the traditional fat cattle market.
Max Fleming sold 12 Angus steers, 455 kilograms, for $1755 at the Pakenham store sale, which equaled 385c/kg lwt.
With demand being steady, or even a little dearer at Pakenham, Monday, these steers would still only have achieved around 360c/kg lwt. Markets at Wagga Wagga and Wodonga reflect much stronger demand for yearling steers for grain feeding, or the paddock with some sales up to 465c/kg lwt.
Most of the higher prices were for lighter weight steers, but plenty of yearlings sold from 380-425c/kg lwt.
Where does this leave physical sales?
Most of the yearling steers sold to trade buyers ranged from 360-390c with isolated sales of grain finished steers to 406c/kg, which was paid at Wodonga, Tuesday.
The highlight of the past seven days was the sale of vealers at Warragul, which reached 410.2c/kg last Wednesday. Several small sales were noted from 390-410c/kg. Producers may well be in the box seat, having grass and for some the need to put more weight on cattle. Supply did increase at most markets, which gave a lack lustre group of export processors room to move. However, the move was mostly equal to slightly cheaper.
Still small in number, better quality bullocks sold from 335-367c/kg lwt. Even though prices were tentative, a pen of Friesian bullocks, 596kgs lwt, sold for 318.6c/kg at Pakenham.
Lighter weight bullocks and grown steers, 500-600kgs lwt, observed both local trade and export competition, and sold from 345-380c/kg lwt with quality steers.
Trade cattle continue to sell well with the majority of good quality grass and grain finished steers and heifers selling from 355-390c/kg.
Over all of the cow sales reported by MLA, the general trend was for lean dairy cows to ease in price. While supply was slightly lower, prices were mostly between 165 & 215c/kg.
Prices for better quality cows did vary between the different markets. Most were a little cheaper, but some markets were steady. This created a larger range of prices with most being from 245-280c with some isolated sales to 289c/kg.
Mentioned earlier was the opportunity for producers to control prices. If they are not happy with prices, they now have the ability to hold supply back, which could trigger stronger demand.
The only negative to this is the lack of intensity of export processors at most sales. Their contribution is hampered by their loss of profit with world markets being unsteady.
*See Stock & Land’s market indicators for weekly averages.
