Demand for U.S. Steer hides exceeded supply last week. Suppliers had few, if any, Steer hides on their offer lists last week, indicating that they were sold further out then they were comfortable with. The fact that the Steer hides were not offered did not stop some tanners from bidding on the Heavy Native Steer, Butt Branded and Dairy Steer hide selections. In the end, there was some Steer hide business put on the books last week, at prices that were steady to up $1.00 or so higher. U.S. Cow hide suppliers, on the other hand, struggled to hold prices steady. But, we think they did find enough interested buyers at prices near or at steady money to improve their sold positions to more comfortable levels. Asian tanners who use U.S. Plump cow hides say that lower priced wet blue hides and crust leather from South America has put downward pressure on U.S. Cow hides. However, some sources last week were saying that the prices of the South American materials have bottomed out. But we have yet to see that reflected in the U.S. Plump Cow hide prices. Most tanners continue to say that their finished leather sales are down from a year ago by about 15 percent. Shoe leather tanners say their business picked up somewhat recently, but they are still looking for a stronger indication of the directions of retail shoe sales. Interesting is the development of new sources of U.S. wet blue hides. More U.S. raw hides are being exported to tanneries where they are being tanned and sold in the blue to finish leather tanners in other countries like China and Japan. Thailand and Mexico are two of the countries that are tanning U.S. hides for resale in the wet blue state, and these countries are, and will be, competing with U.S. domestic Wet Blue tanners/suppliers. It appears that there are cost-saving advantages to bluing outside of the U.S. in countries like Thailand and Mexico. The cost of labor is said to be a major factor. We are putting last week’s FOB plant values for the U.S. Big Packer Steer hide selections at the following levels: Heavy Native Steer hides $62.00 per piece, Butt Branded Steer hides at between $57.00 and $58.00 per hide and for the Heavy Texas Steer hides we are calling at between $48.00 and $50.00 per hide.
The Export Sales Report released by the USDA on November 9, 2017 for the seven-day period ending Thursday, November 2nd stated that robust 808,600 whole cattle hides, and wet blue equivalents were sold for export during that week. The weekly exports were also a considerable number coming in at 618,400.
Federally Inspected Slaughter, (FIS) for the week ending Saturday November 11, 2017, was estimated to be 623,000 cattle, down from the estimated 642,000 head processed the prior week. Year to Date FIS of cattle is up 1,445,000 head or 5.6 percent from the same period last year.
Don’t look for anything different for the U.S. Steer hide market this week from what we saw last week. Packers/Sellers will be asking slightly higher prices for all their Steer hide selections. If tanners/buyers want or need to buy any of those selections, they will be wasting their time if they bid anything less than last traded levels. We also feel that U.S. Cow hide sellers may, finally, be in position this week to refuse any bids that are lower than their last sales prices. We say this because of the recent business that U.S. Cow hide suppliers have put on books in the last couple weeks, albeit those sales prices were at their lowest levels several years. So, we look for U.S. Steer hide prices to move slightly higher this week and for U.S. Cow hide values to remain no less than steady.
Mulligan’s Laws
If you leave your 3-iron at home, then your 4-iron will become impossible to hit; if you leave your 3 and your 4-iron at home, your 5-iron will become impossible to hit.
If you stop for a beer at the end of the round, you will hear someone bitching about a 78.
