The front month live cattle futures market is up 22 to 82 cents so far, with April having gotten to $173.30 earlier in the session. Feeder cattle futures are up by $0.65 to $1.42 at midday, save for the April contract that is 5 cents lower. The midweek FCE auction had no sales for the 1,242 head listed between $170 bids and $174-175 asks. The CME Feeder Cattle Index for 4/10 was 32 cents weaker at $193.01.
USDA’s Wholesale Boxed Beef prices for Wednesday morning were $3.33 higher to $298.43 for Choice and $1.04 higher to $283.08 in Select. Tuesday’s federally inspected cattle slaughter was 126k head. That set the week to date running total at 239,000 head, and trails last week’s pace by 4k head.
