THERE’S been little change evident in direct consignment grid offers from Eastern states beef processors this week, despite some big money being paid for desirable heavy cows in the saleyards system since Thursday.

That’s evidently being driven by two things – some rain disruptions to kill rosters and a resurgent international grinding beef market, which for the first time in history crept beyond A1100c/kg for 90CL cow meat into the US last week, on the back of rapidly declining US beef production.

For context, the 90CL indicator only went past A1000c/kg for the first time just before Christmas, and has jumped A35c/kg in the past week.

Combined with weather delays, it’s fuelled some unbelievable prices for good quality cows in saleyards this week. Worth noting, saleyards are inevitably first-movers when market dynamics change like this, but equally, are often the first to fall when the cycle changes.

Gunnedah sale this morning saw big-framed Santa cows sell to 440c/kg liveweight, while cows at Roma store sale this morning sold to what may be a saleyards record of 440c/kg. At a generous 52pc dressing percentage, that values those cows at an incredible 846c/kg dressed weight. And that’s before freight, to get them home to Victoria for processing (toss in another lazy $150 a head).

One large southern processor operating at Roma this morning bought a large wedge of slaughter cows for an estimated average price of 395c/kg liveweight, with freight yet to come.

It seems like only yesterday that this weekly item was reporting cow prices ‘approaching 400c/kg’ for the first time since 2022.

Not surprisingly, the NLRS Processor Cow Indicator (see image) this afternoon sits at 342c/kg liveweight (that includes all cow descriptions +400kg sold to processors), up another 27c since 21 July, and up more than 50c/kg overt the past month.

Weather impact

Some minor weather disruptions were across eastern states were reported by processors this week, following the recent rain event (see BOM seven-day rainfall image to 9am yesterday).

Most delays are only likely to be for a day or two, contacts said.

Queensland processor over the hooks grids were mostly unchanged this week, clearly less impacted by rain events than areas further south.

In southern Queensland, after some 20c/kg rises in stages last week and the week before, competitive export processor grids are unchanged this week.

Good quality heavy slaughter cows +300kg are priced at 580c/kg dressed weight in southern parts of Queensland, with four-tooth grass ox at 650c/kg (some of those offers no-HGP only).

Central Queensland sheds remain 10-20c behind those rates based on freight differential, with North Queensland another 20c behind that.

In the southern states, quotes seen out of the eastern regions of South Australia have cows up another 20c/kg this week to 680c/kg and four-tooth grass steers, 750c (following a similar rise last week), while southern regions of NSW are unchanged, with cows 660c and the steer 730c.

A southern NSW specialist cow processor has a grid out today for heavy cows +300kg at 615c/kg, and lighter +280kg descriptions 605c.

Slaughter continues to ease

National slaughter numbers continued to soften last week, partly rain-related.

The seven-day national kill ended Friday reached 153,415 head, down 1.2 percent on the previous week, but still 8.5pc higher than this time last year.

All states bar Western Australia recorded lower rates of production, week-on-week.

Despite slipping a little, Queensland’s kill remained above 80,000 head, while NSW slipped a little further to 36,316 head, almost 2500 head below the season high set back in May.

Female slaughter ratio remained high at just below 50pc.

A milestone was reached when year-to-date slaughter recorded by NLRS passed four million head, reaching 4.002 million by Friday.

Saleyards

Recent rain has clearly disrupted numbers in some selling centres since the weekend. Cow prices continued to surge at many centres.

Gunnedah yarded only 1580 head this morning, down 770 on last week. Southern processor buyers again made their presence felt. Competition resulted in significantly dearer trends. A standout offering of high yielding Santa cross cows topped the heavy cow sale 430-440c/kg. Grown heifers over 540kg to process gained 39c/kg making to 442c/kg. Heavy cows averaged 419c/kg, as much as 67c/kg dearer.

Wodonga sale produced a small yarding of only 400 head this morning, with quality remaining mixed across the board. The usual winter buyers were present and actively participating, contributing to a very strong sale. One of the highlights of the sale was the cow market, which saw a significant boost driven by the limited numbers in all weight categories. Heavy steers and bullocks were in short supply for processors, with prices ranging from 433-476c/kg. This scarcity of cows contributed to the upward momentum in the market, with prices surging 38-43c/kg. The lack of available numbers ahead further fuelled this trend, with heavy cows selling from 380-440c/kg.  On the other hand, leaner cows weighing under 520kg experienced a more erratic market, with prices fluctuating for most between 298-362c/kg.

There was no preliminary Roma report available when this item was published. Full details tomorrow.