Daily Cattle Market Briefings

DAILY CATTLE MARKET BRIEFING
June 27, 2026

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

1. MARKET SENTIMENT: MODERATELY BULLISH — Score: 7 out of 10

Cash cattle prices are holding firm with cattle owners maintaining leverage against packers. The northern market traded at $260 live and $408-$410 dressed, while Texas bids of $258 failed to buy cattle with some negotiated grid trades closing at $260. Futures confirmed the bullish tone, with CME August live cattle closing up 0.700 cent at 247.225 cents per pound and feeder cattle surging higher on strong cash support. Tight fed cattle supplies remain the dominant market driver, though box prices softening toward week's end and a shortened holiday slaughter week introduce near-term uncertainty.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

2. KEY PRICE TRENDS

CASH FED CATTLE: Northern markets trading at $260 live / $408-$410 dressed. Texas bids at $258 failing to buy cattle. Negotiated grid bases closing at $260. Cash market maintaining a significant premium to futures, which analysts say keeps futures from falling further.

BOXED BEEF: Choice cutout hovering just below $400, with USDA reporting choice cuts at $397.14 per cwt (down $1.80 Thursday morning) and select at $376.41 per cwt (down $1.73). The choice-select spread continues to widen, reflecting quality grade pressure from summer heat. Retailers are reporting disappointment in middle meat performance.

FEEDER CATTLE: Oklahoma City saw feeder steers over 800 lbs up $5-$15 per cwt, under 800 lbs up $1-$3, feeder heifers up $5-$15, and calves up $8-$15. OKC West showed steer calves up $5-$15 with light 500-weight calves up to $30 higher and heifer calves up $15-$25. Demand described as very good to strong across the board.

CARCASS WEIGHTS: Latest Comprehensive Fed Cattle Weekly Report shows carcass weights at 946 lbs, down 1 lb from prior week but still 37 lbs heavier than last year. Quality grade at 87.3%, down 0.9% week over week.

CORN: Prices moved higher as oil jumped on war uncertainty. Corn basis in Guymon, Oklahoma at +$1.10 over the July contract, driven partly by truck traffic diverted to gravel roads for new data center construction.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

3. TOP 3 NEW DEVELOPMENTS

DEVELOPMENT 1: SCREWWORM DETECTIONS CONTINUE TO SPREAD IN TEXAS

As of June 24th, total confirmed New World Screwworm detections have reached 19 cases, with 4 new cases added in the latest reporting period — including 3 cattle and 1 goat, all in Edwards County, Texas. On a positive note, the US and Mexico are set to inaugurate a jointly-funded sterile insect fly plant in Chiapas, Mexico, which is seen as a key long-term weapon against the pest. However, the ongoing detections in southwest Texas represent a live biosecurity threat for ranchers in the region and could further complicate already-disrupted Mexican cattle import channels.

DEVELOPMENT 2: SENATOR CASSIDY INTRODUCES HOME MARKET RESTORATION ACT OF 2026

Senator Bill Cassidy (R-LA) has introduced legislation that would establish tariff-rate quotas on import-sensitive agricultural products, explicitly including live cattle and beef. The bill would apply higher duties on imports above quota thresholds and create country-by-country quota structures. The legislation is backed by R-CALF USA, whose CEO noted that over 22% of beef consumed in the US is currently sourced from foreign countries. If passed, this bill would directly reduce beef import competition and provide structural support to domestic cattle prices. Beef imports are currently rising to meet pre-4th of July hamburger demand, making the timing of this legislation particularly relevant.

DEVELOPMENT 3: HEAT STRESS THREATENING CATTLE PERFORMANCE ON BOTH SIDES OF THE ATLANTIC

Extreme heat is simultaneously impacting cattle operations in Europe and the US plains. Belgium issued a rare red alert for extreme heat, with one farmer reporting losses of 150-200 euros per day — roughly 10-15% of daily income — due to reduced milk output and slower livestock weight gain. In France, extreme heat killed hundreds of thousands of poultry and cut cattle milk output. In the US, plains heat is influencing cattle performance, contributing to the observed decline in carcass weights and widening the choice-select spread. Heat stress is also suppressing consumer appetite patterns heading into the 4th of July demand window.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

4. OUTLOOK

SHORT-TERM (Next 1-2 Weeks): Expect a tighter-than-normal trade week ahead with most packing plants closed Friday, July 3rd. Reduced slaughter volumes — already running 32,000 head under last year at 526,000 head this past week — should provide some support to box prices after recent softness. Cattle owners retain pricing leverage and should not feel pressure to move cattle at packer bids below $260. Watch for packer behavior early next week as they attempt to fill shortened schedules.

WEATHER WATCH: Widespread rains across Oklahoma and the southern Plains are improving pasture conditions and supporting feeder cattle demand. This is providing a psychological lift to replacement markets. However, heat stress in the central plains remains a factor in cattle performance and could continue to push carcass weights lower and quality grades down through summer.

BIOSECURITY ALERT: Ranchers in southwest Texas and neighboring areas should remain on high alert for screwworm. Inspect livestock regularly and report any suspicious wounds to USDA immediately. The new sterile fly plant in Chiapas represents a longer-term solution, but near-term risk remains elevated.

LEGISLATIVE WATCH: The Cassidy Home Market Restoration Act is worth monitoring closely. If it gains traction, it would represent meaningful structural support for domestic cattle prices by limiting import competition — particularly relevant as beef imports continue to rise to fill the grind market gap caused by tight domestic supplies.

FEEDING MARGINS: Corn basis levels remain elevated at +$1.10 in the Oklahoma panhandle, keeping feeding cost pressure high. Combined with processing plant capacity reductions, feeding margins remain under stress. Producers should evaluate placement decisions carefully as the industry transitions toward increasing calf supplies in the coming year.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Sources: Cattle Range, The Cattle Site, CME/Reuters, USDA, US Meat Export Federation, Senate.gov

DAILY CATTLE MARKET BRIEFING
June 26, 2026

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

1. MARKET SENTIMENT: CAUTIOUSLY BULLISH — Score: 6 out of 10

Cash markets remain firm and cattle owners retain leverage on tight fed supplies, but futures are trading well below cash, consumer financial stress is at record highs, and export headwinds are mounting. The near-term picture favors producers holding cattle, but demand-side risks are growing and deserve close attention heading into the second half of 2026.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

2. KEY PRICE TRENDS

Fed Cattle Cash: Early week spotted sales in the north came in at $260 live and $408 dressed. Last week's range was $258-$260 live, suggesting modest upward pressure is continuing.

Boxed Beef: Choice cutout crossed $400 per cwt on Tuesday, reported at $400.26, up $4.20. Select cuts rose $7.18 to $382.77. The choice-select spread is widening, which is pushing slaughter weights lower as packers and feeders respond to quality premiums.

Futures: CME August live cattle settled at 246.000 cents per pound, down 1.350 cents on Tuesday. August feeder cattle closed at 368.150 cents, down 2.275 cents. The gap between futures and cash remains significant, creating both speculative opportunity and uncertainty.

Feeder Cattle: Oklahoma City reported feeder steers over 800 lbs up $5 to $15 higher, calves up $8 to $15, and heifer calves up $10 to $20. OKC West steer calves were up $5 to $15, with light 500-pound weights up as much as $30. Demand described as very good across both yards.

Carcass Weights: The latest Comprehensive Fed Cattle Weekly Report shows carcass weights at 946 pounds, down 1 pound from the prior week but still 37 pounds heavier than last year. Quality grade came in at 87.3 percent, down 0.9 percent week over week. A slow seasonal decline in quality grades is expected through summer.

Corn: Corn prices moved lower, though basis levels in Guymon, Oklahoma surged to plus $1.10 over the July contract, driven partly by truck shortages as vehicles are being redirected to gravel haul for data center construction projects.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

3. TOP 3 NEW DEVELOPMENTS

DEVELOPMENT 1: Consumer Demand Warning — Record Financial Stress Threatens Beef's Pricing Power

The May 2026 Meat Demand Monitor shows 39 percent of U.S. residents report their household finances are worse than a year ago — the highest reading for May since the MDM series launched in 2020. This directly corresponded with weaker beef demand in May. Compounding this, more than 4.7 million Americans have lost SNAP food stamp benefits since last July, roughly 11 percent of all participants, with Arizona losing nearly half its enrolled recipients. Food pantry demand in Arizona hit record levels in April. With beef already at historically high prices, the combination of reduced purchasing power among lower-income consumers and shrinking food assistance programs represents a meaningful and growing risk to retail beef demand heading into the back half of summer.

DEVELOPMENT 2: New World Screwworm Advances — 19 Confirmed U.S. Cases

As of June 24, confirmed New World Screwworm detections in the United States have reached 19 total cases, with 4 new cases added in just the past two days — 3 cattle and 1 goat, all in Edwards County, Texas. The last official USDA-confirmed case prior to this cluster was June 12. Analysts at Kansas State University note there is no direct food safety concern and therefore no expected direct hit to consumer beef demand, but the situation remains fluid. Oklahoma State's Derrell Peel warns the battle against NWS never truly ends and that the rapid northward spread through Central America and Mexico in 2024-2025 was enabled in part by increased cattle movement and lapses in sterile fly coverage. Producers in Texas and the Southwest should remain on high alert.

DEVELOPMENT 3: U.S. Beef Export Weakness Adds to Demand-Side Pressure

U.S. beef exports to two of the nation's largest customers declined sharply in April. Shipments to Japan fell 22 percent in volume and 15 percent in value year over year, with four-month totals down 9 percent to 74,959 metric tons. Exports to South Korea dropped 14 percent in volume and 7 percent in value in April, though value still exceeded $200 million for the second consecutive month. A surging U.S. dollar — which hit a 13-month high this week on expectations of a more hawkish Federal Reserve — is making U.S. beef more expensive for international buyers and threatens to further suppress export volumes in the months ahead. Meanwhile, beef imports from Mexico continue to rise, climbing from 600 million pounds in 2024 to 700 million pounds in 2025, as Mexican processors like SuKarne expand operations following the U.S. border closure to Mexican cattle imports.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

4. OUTLOOK: WHAT RANCHERS SHOULD EXPECT

Near-Term (Next 2-4 Weeks): Cash markets should remain supported through the Fourth of July holiday as retailers build beef features and demand for ground beef drives imports higher. Packers are cutting slaughter volumes — this week's kill of 526,000 head was 32,000 below last year — in an effort to firm up box prices. That strategy should provide some upward pressure on the cutout in the coming week. Feeder cattle markets are riding positive momentum from last week's Cattle on Feed report, which showed May placements down 10 percent, tighter than expected. Ranchers holding feeder cattle are in a favorable position.

Intermediate-Term (Summer into Fall): The fundamental tightness in fed cattle supplies remains intact and cattle owners retain leverage. However, the demand side is flashing yellow. Record consumer financial stress, SNAP benefit cuts affecting millions of households, weakening export markets, and a strong dollar all point to a more fragile demand environment than the headline box prices suggest. Slaughter weights trending down and quality grades beginning their seasonal decline will bear watching. The widening choice-select spread may also signal retailers are struggling to move middle meats at current price levels.

Weather and Pasture: Widespread rainfall across Oklahoma and the southern Plains has improved forage conditions and lifted replacement cattle demand. The drought footprint in the Lower 48 has shrunk 10.5 percent over the past month. Tropical Storm Arthur near the southeast Texas coast is expected to deliver additional drought relief to the Deep South. Improved pasture conditions support holding decisions for cow-calf operators but may also encourage lighter placements into feedyards as grass availability extends grazing programs.

Key Risk to Watch: The combination of SNAP cuts reducing purchasing power for millions of beef consumers, record consumer financial stress in the MDM, and weakening export demand creates a scenario where strong wholesale prices could face a demand correction later this summer. Ranchers planning marketing strategies for fall cattle should factor in this demand risk alongside the well-documented supply tightness.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Sources: Cattle Range, CME/Reuters, USMEF, USDA APHIS Screwworm Dashboard, K-State Meat Demand Monitor, Oklahoma State University Extension

DAILY CATTLE MARKET BRIEFING
June 25, 2026

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

1. MARKET SENTIMENT: CAUTIOUSLY BULLISH — Score: 6 out of 10

The market carries genuine bullish underpinning from tight fed cattle supplies, strong feeder cattle cash prices, and a pre-holiday demand window. However, several headwinds are emerging simultaneously: profit-taking pressure in futures, a surging U.S. dollar at a 13-month high, weakening consumer finances hitting record lows, softening export volumes to Japan and Korea, and the looming threat of New World Screwworm. The net picture is a market with solid structural support but increasing friction from the demand side.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

2. KEY PRICE TRENDS

FED CATTLE CASH: Early week northern sales reported at $260 live and $408 dressed. Last week's range was $258-$260 live. Prices are holding firm with cattle owners retaining leverage given tight supplies.

BOXED BEEF: Choice cutout crossed $400 per cwt on Tuesday, with USDA pricing choice at $400.26/cwt and select at $382.77/cwt. The choice-select spread is widening, a signal of quality tightening as summer progresses. Carcass weights are trending down, now at 946 lbs, down 1 lb from the prior week but still 37 lbs heavier than last year.

FUTURES: CME August live cattle closed Tuesday at 246.00 cents per pound, down 1.35 cents on the day after profit-taking. August feeder cattle settled at 368.15 cents per pound, down 2.275 cents. Futures remain well below cash, creating a persistent gap that speculators are attempting to exploit. The strong dollar added headwinds to futures on Tuesday.

FEEDER CATTLE CASH: Oklahoma City reported feeder steers over 800 lbs up $5-$15 higher on the week. Steers under 800 lbs were $1-$3 higher. Calves were $8-$15 higher and heifer calves $10-$20 higher. OKC West saw steer calves $5-$15 higher with light 500-weight calves up to $30 higher. Six-hundred-pound steers are bringing well over $500 and 800-lb steers are selling well over $400.

CORN: Futures moved lower. Basis levels in Guymon, Oklahoma reached +$1.10 over the July contract, driven in part by truck shortages as vehicles are redirected to gravel hauling for data center construction projects.

EXPORTS: U.S. beef exports to Japan fell 22% year-over-year in April to 17,563 metric tons, with value down 15% to $140.1 million. Four-month totals to Japan are down 9%. Korea exports fell 14% in April in volume but held above $200 million in value for the second consecutive month. Won weakness is weighing on Korean demand.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

3. TOP 3 NEW DEVELOPMENTS

DEVELOPMENT 1: CONSUMER FINANCIAL STRESS HITS RECORD HIGH — A DIRECT DEMAND THREAT

The May 2026 Meat Demand Monitor, cited by Kansas State University's Glynn Tonsor, reveals that 39% of U.S. residents now report their household finances are worse than a year ago — the highest reading for May since the MDM series launched in 2020. This corresponds with measurably weaker beef demand in May. Separately, more than 4.7 million Americans have lost SNAP food stamp benefits since the new federal spending law took effect last July, representing roughly 11% of all participants. Arizona alone lost over 457,000 recipients. Food pantry usage in Arizona surpassed SNAP enrollment in April. The combination of record consumer financial stress and reduced purchasing power for millions of lower-income households represents the most significant demand-side risk facing the cattle market heading into the second half of 2026. High beef prices have historically been the industry's strength — they are now becoming a vulnerability.

DEVELOPMENT 2: CATTLE ON FEED REPORT CONFIRMS TIGHT SUPPLY BUT RAISES FORWARD QUESTIONS

The June USDA Cattle on Feed report showed June 1 feedlot inventories at 2% above year-ago levels, slightly below analyst expectations of a 2.5% increase. More significantly, May placements were down 10% from a year ago — sharply below the market's expected 5.5% decline. May marketings were down 12%, versus an estimated 10.6% decline. The placement miss signals feeders are stretching cattle over more days and that replacement supply remains constrained. This supports near-term cash prices but raises concerns about production volumes later in 2026. The report was described as net neutral by analysts but its bullish elements are already reflected in elevated cash prices.

DEVELOPMENT 3: NEW WORLD SCREWWORM REACHES 15 CONFIRMED U.S. CASES

As of Monday June 23, USDA confirmed 15 cases of New World Screwworm in the United States. The last confirmed case per USDA APHIS was June 12, offering some short-term relief, but analysts caution the situation remains fluid. Historical context is sobering: in 1972, Texas alone reported more than 90,000 NWS cases. Oklahoma State's Derrell Peel notes the pest moved rapidly from Panama through Central America and Mexico between 2023 and 2026, in part due to increased cattle movement and weakened sterile fly barrier operations. The pest does not pose a food safety risk and is not expected to directly suppress consumer beef demand, but it does represent a potential further constriction of cattle supply if it spreads. Continued joint cooperation between the U.S., Mexico, and Central American governments will be essential to pushing the barrier south again.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

4. OUTLOOK: WHAT RANCHERS SHOULD EXPECT

NEAR-TERM (Next 2-3 Weeks): The 4th of July demand window should provide modest support for box prices, particularly for grinds. Slaughter volumes are expected to remain reduced as packers attempt to revive beef demand. The choice cutout holding above $400 is a positive signal heading into the holiday. Cash fed cattle prices should hold near current levels given tight supplies. Show lists are larger following last week's light packer purchases, so watch for any softening in negotiated prices mid-week.

FEEDER AND STOCKER MARKETS: Despite a growing narrative that stocker and feeder prices have peaked, cash markets continue to post record prices daily. Recent rains across Oklahoma and other dry southern areas have refreshed pastures and renewed grazing demand, supporting calf values. However, the record-high breakevens being locked in at current placement prices will create pressure on feeding margins in coming months. The corn basis elevation in the Southern Plains adds to that concern.

DEMAND RISKS TO WATCH: The record consumer financial stress reading from the Meat Demand Monitor is not a data point to dismiss. If beef prices at retail remain elevated while household budgets tighten further, demand erosion could accelerate into fall. The strong U.S. dollar is simultaneously pressuring export competitiveness in key markets like Japan and Korea. Ranchers who are forward-pricing cattle should factor in the possibility that packer margins — already thin — could deteriorate further if box prices soften while fed cattle cash holds firm.

STRUCTURAL BACKDROP: The longer-term picture remains constructive for cattle owners. The Mexican border closure has permanently restructured replacement supply flows. The beef-on-dairy trend is distorting placement data and masking the true extent of beef heifer retention. Calf supplies are expected to increase in the coming year, but the transition period keeps leverage with current cattle owners. The New World Screwworm situation bears close monitoring — a significant outbreak would further tighten supply at a time when the industry can least absorb it.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Sources: Cattle Range Market Analysis, CME via Reuters, USMEF, USDA APHIS, Kansas State University Meat Demand Monitor, Oklahoma State University Extension, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada

DAILY CATTLE MARKET BRIEFING
June 23, 2026

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

1. MARKET SENTIMENT: BEARISH-TO-NEUTRAL | Score: 4/10

The screwworm situation is the dominant story shaping cattle market sentiment right now. With confirmed US cases climbing and eradication infrastructure still years away from full capacity, ranchers face meaningful near-term production risk. Beef prices are already near record highs partly in response to this threat, but sustained upward pressure depends on how aggressively the outbreak spreads. The sterile fly shortage is a critical bottleneck that limits the effectiveness of the primary eradication tool, adding to uncertainty. Until containment shows clear progress, expect a cautious, risk-off posture from buyers and producers alike.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

2. KEY PRICE TRENDS

Beef prices have risen to near record highs, with the screwworm outbreak cited as a contributing driver. The pest's confirmed presence in Texas, combined with the potential for rapid spread, is creating supply-side anxiety. Economic modeling has projected that a widespread screwworm outbreak could cost Texas alone $1.8 billion in damages, a figure that underscores the scale of market disruption possible if containment fails. No significant price relief is expected in the short term given the eradication capacity gap.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

3. TOP 3 NEW DEVELOPMENTS

DEVELOPMENT 1: US Screwworm Cases Rise to 15
Three new confirmed cases, one lamb in Crockett County and two calves in Edwards County, Texas, were reported on June 22, bringing the national total to 15. This marks the first domestic screwworm infestation in over 40 years. The USDA is deploying tens of millions of sterile flies in affected areas, but the scale of response needed far outpaces current capacity. The primary sterile fly production facility in Panama produces roughly 100 million flies per week, while emergency response may require up to 600 million per week.

DEVELOPMENT 2: UN Agencies Launch $1 Million Screwworm Research Project
The International Atomic Energy Agency and the UN Food and Agriculture Organization have jointly launched a $1 million project aimed at containing the screwworm outbreak across the Americas. The initiative focuses on scaling up sterile insect production and addressing the critical shortage of sterile flies. Planned facilities in Metapa de Dominguez, Mexico, and Mission, Texas, could eventually add up to 400 million sterile flies per week, but meaningful capacity is still years away. The USDA's new Texas facility is not expected to come online until late 2027.

DEVELOPMENT 3: Food Safety Research Challenges Zero-Detection Standards
A Cornell University study published in Frontiers in Science argues that current zero-detection food safety regulations may be driving unnecessary food waste, inflating costs, and triggering recalls without proportional public health benefit. Researchers advocate for risk-based approaches that weigh actual likelihood of illness against economic, nutritional, and environmental trade-offs. While not a direct cattle market mover today, this research could eventually influence beef processing and inspection standards, affecting compliance costs and recall frequency for beef producers and packers.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

4. OUTLOOK

The screwworm situation is the clearest and most immediate threat to cattle producers in the near term. With 15 confirmed cases, a sterile fly shortage, and the primary new production facility not operational until late 2027, ranchers in Texas and surrounding states should treat this as an active, evolving biosecurity emergency rather than a contained incident.

Ranchers should take the following into account going forward:

Monitor herds closely for signs of screwworm infestation, particularly any animal with open wounds. Early detection and treatment are critical, as larvae can kill a host animal if left untreated. Work with local veterinarians and USDA contacts to understand reporting protocols and available treatment resources.

Expect continued price volatility. Near-record beef prices reflect market anxiety about supply disruption. If the outbreak expands beyond Texas, price movements could intensify in either direction depending on how markets interpret containment progress.

Watch for federal and state policy responses. The USDA and international agencies are mobilizing, but the gap between current sterile fly capacity and what is needed for effective eradication is substantial. Additional funding, emergency declarations, or import/movement restrictions could emerge quickly and affect operations and marketing timelines.

On the food safety research front, ranchers and beef processors should track whether the Cornell study prompts regulatory conversations at USDA or FDA. A shift toward risk-based inspection standards could reduce recall exposure and compliance costs over the longer term, but meaningful policy change is likely several years away.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Briefing prepared for: June 23, 2026
Next update: June 24, 2026

DAILY CATTLE MARKET BRIEFING
June 20, 2026

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

1. MARKET SENTIMENT: Cautiously Bullish | Score: 6.5/10

The fundamental supply story remains solidly bullish — cattle supplies are historically tight, slaughter volumes are running well below year-ago levels, and feedlot placements are falling sharply. However, near-term headwinds are building: futures pulled back Thursday on profit-taking and post-Father's Day demand concerns, packer margins remain deeply negative, and retailers are resisting beef at current price levels. The basis is tightening as the gap between high cash prices and lower futures begins to close. Cash cattle owners retain pricing leverage, but the market is navigating a delicate transition between peak grilling season demand and the seasonal summer slowdown.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

2. KEY PRICE TRENDS

FED CATTLE CASH: After bids opened at $254 earlier in the week, cash trade moved to $258-$260 per cwt by Friday, with most trades completing at $258 and some at $260. Asking prices in Texas were reported at $260-$262. The prior week's national weighted average was $256.08, down 45 cents from the week before.

FUTURES: CME August live cattle settled Thursday at $246.625/cwt, down $2.225 on the session. June live cattle settled at $254.800, down $0.925. August feeder cattle closed at $366.600, down $0.825. Earlier in the week, August live cattle had rallied to a four-week high of $249.20 and August feeders hit a five-week high of $366.875 before Thursday's retreat.

FEEDER CATTLE CASH: Oklahoma City reported feeder steers $2.00-$10.00 higher week-over-week, with 600-pound-weight class calves up as much as $20.00. OKC West showed steer calves $10.00-$20.00 higher and heifer calves $5.00-$15.00 higher. Demand described as good across both markets following weekend rains across Oklahoma.

SLAUGHTER AND WEIGHTS: Weekly slaughter came in at 524,000 head, 9,000 below the prior week and 36,000 below year-ago levels — one of the lowest non-holiday weeks in recent memory. Carcass weights at 947 pounds are 1 pound lower than the prior week but still 38 pounds heavier than last year. Quality grade reached 88.2%, up 0.6% week-over-week, though a slow seasonal decline is expected through summer.

CHOICE/SELECT SPREAD: Widening, driven by lower slaughter weights and declining grading percentages — a signal of tighter fed cattle quality flowing through the supply chain.

CORN: Prices moved higher. The corn basis in Guymon, Oklahoma reached +$1.10 over the July contract, with truck shortages attributed to data center construction diverting gravel road traffic as a contributing factor.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

3. TOP 3 NEW DEVELOPMENTS

DEVELOPMENT 1: CATTLE ON FEED REPORT CONFIRMS TIGHTENING SUPPLY PIPELINE

The June USDA Cattle on Feed report, released June 19, showed feedlot inventories at 11.7 million head on June 1, up 2% from a year ago — slightly below the analyst estimate of 2.5%. More significant were the placement and marketing numbers. May placements came in at 1.70 million head, down 10% from 2025 and far below the trade estimate of a 5.5% decline. May marketings totaled 1.55 million head, down 12% from year-ago levels — the second lowest May marketing total since the data series began in 1996. The sharply lower-than-expected placements confirm that the cattle supply pipeline is tightening more aggressively than the market had anticipated. While the report initially pressured futures on Thursday, the underlying data is structurally bullish for cattle prices over the coming months. Industry observers note the report is receiving less attention than in prior years due to concerns about data accuracy from mail-out surveys, but the directional signal is clear.

DEVELOPMENT 2: USDA COMMITS $105 MILLION TO NEW WORLD SCREWWORM DEFENSE

USDA approved 40 projects totaling approximately $105 million to strengthen surveillance, prevention, and response capabilities against New World Screwworm (NWS). As of this week, APHIS reports 12 total detected cases in Texas and New Mexico, with 11 active and one inactive. Critically, there are no detections in wild or feral animal populations and no positive fly-trap captures, meaning there is currently no evidence of an established breeding population. The most recent confirmed case — a sheep in Sutton County, Texas on June 12 — is now listed as inactive. The scale of the investment signals that USDA views NWS as a prolonged biosecurity challenge, not a short-term event. For the cattle market, the contained case count is supportive of current bullish sentiment in futures, while the absence of wildlife spread is the key indicator to watch. A Texas rancher from Tom Green County provided a first-hand account this week of identifying, reporting, and treating NWS on his operation, highlighting the ground-level vigilance now required across the Southern Plains.

DEVELOPMENT 3: JBS CLOSES PENNSYLVANIA PLANT AS PACKER CAPACITY CONTRACTS

JBS announced plans to close its Souderton, Pennsylvania beef plant, which employs approximately 1,700 workers and can slaughter around 2,000 cattle per day. The company cited short cattle supplies as the reason. JBS is also closing a smaller Memphis packaging facility employing about 200 people, while maintaining its planned $150 million investment in its larger Cactus, Texas plant. This closure is part of a broader industry trend: packer margins have been deeply negative for weeks as high cattle procurement costs squeeze profitability. The industry is managing this by cutting slaughter volumes — the 524,000-head weekly kill reflects this deliberate pullback — in hopes of tightening box beef supply and reviving wholesale prices. For cattle producers, fewer processing slots means continued leverage in cash negotiations, but it also raises longer-term concerns about regional access to packing capacity as the industry consolidates around fewer, larger facilities.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

4. OUTLOOK: WHAT RANCHERS SHOULD EXPECT

NEAR-TERM (2-4 WEEKS): Cash cattle prices should hold in the $256-$262 range as packers attempt to manage margins through reduced slaughter rather than aggressive buying. Box beef prices are expected to firm modestly as processors tighten supply ahead of the post-Father's Day period. Futures may remain under pressure as traders price in seasonal demand softening after the peak grilling holiday. The basis tightening trend bears watching — if futures continue to lag cash, forward contract opportunities may become less attractive.

FEEDER AND REPLACEMENT MARKETS: Recent rains across Oklahoma and the southern Plains have refreshed drought-stressed pastures and cooled temperatures, providing short-term grazing relief. This moisture is expected to slow feedlot placements further in June, extending the tight supply trend identified in the May COF data. Feeder cattle demand is strong, with prices running $10-$20 higher on lighter calves. Producers with grass and water are in a strong position to hold cattle and capture additional gain before marketing.

SUPPLY STRUCTURE: The beef import story is real but nuanced. Imports are filling the lean beef deficit for grinding operations while domestic fed cattle continue to command premium prices. The JBS Cactus expansion and similar investments reflect a bifurcated market — ground beef increasingly dependent on imported lean trim, while the premium grain-fed segment remains a domestic stronghold. Ranchers should not interpret import growth as a threat to fed cattle values; current price levels tell the opposite story.

TRADE POLICY WATCH: Two items deserve close attention in coming weeks. First, USMCA renewal faces a July 1 deadline with President Trump publicly questioning the agreement's value. Agricultural groups are pressing for a 16-year extension with duty-free terms. A failure to renew or signal extension could introduce significant uncertainty into the $1.6 trillion North American trade relationship, with direct implications for cattle and beef flows with Mexico and Canada. Second, the EU-Brazil beef dispute over antimicrobial standards could redirect Brazilian beef supplies toward US-competing markets in Asia if no resolution is reached before September, potentially adding modest competitive pressure on US export values in those markets.

NEW WORLD SCREWWORM: Remain vigilant. Inspect livestock regularly, particularly any animals with wounds. Report suspected cases immediately to your state veterinarian. The current containment picture is encouraging, but USDA's $105 million investment signals the federal government expects this to be a sustained challenge through at least the remainder of 2026.

WEATHER: Tropical Storm Arthur near the southeastern Texas coast is expected to deliver additional rainfall across the Deep South and into the Southeast over the next week. The broader drought picture continues to improve, with total drought area down 10.5% over the past month. Above-normal precipitation is forecast for the Midwest and High Plains in the 6-10 day outlook, which should support forage conditions and keep feedlot placement pressure subdued.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
BOTTOM LINE: The structural bull case for cattle remains intact. Tight supplies, record-low slaughter volumes, falling placements, and continued strong consumer demand for beef form a durable foundation. The near-term risk is a seasonal demand lull and continued packer margin pressure that could temporarily soften futures. Cattle owners with leverage should use it — but watch the USMCA deadline and NWS developments closely as potential market-moving wildcards in the weeks ahead.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

DAILY CATTLE MARKET BRIEFING
June 19, 2026

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

1. MARKET SENTIMENT: MODERATELY BULLISH — Score: 6/10

The overall tone remains constructive for cattle owners despite some softening in futures late in the week. Tight fed cattle supplies continue to give producers leverage, cash prices held firm at $256 live and $405-$407 dressed through most of the week, and feeder cattle futures posted strong multi-week highs mid-week. However, bearish pressure emerged Thursday as profit-taking ahead of the Juneteenth holiday, post-Father's Day demand concerns, and a mixed Cattle on Feed report pulled futures lower. Packer margins remain deeply negative, which is a structural drag on the market. The screwworm situation continues to be a net bullish factor for cattle prices, though its headline impact on futures appears to be fading.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

2. KEY PRICE TRENDS

CASH CATTLE: Trade this week showed asking prices in Texas jumping to $260-$262 live, up $2 from the prior week, though final confirmed trades last week averaged $256.08 live and $405 dressed — steady to down slightly from the week prior. Cash markets were thin early in the week.

FUTURES SETTLEMENT (Thursday close):
- June live cattle: 254.800 cents/lb, down 0.925 cents on the day
- August live cattle: 246.625 cents/lb, down 2.225 cents on the day
- August feeder cattle: 366.600 cents/lb, down 0.825 cents on the day

Note: Earlier in the week, August live cattle hit a four-week high of $249.20 and August feeders hit a five-week high of $366.875 before Thursday's pullback.

CUTOUT VALUES: The Choice cutout ended last week at $391.93, down $0.77 week-over-week. The Select cutout fell sharply to $372.72, down $9.97 on the week, widening the Choice/Select spread to more seasonally normal levels. Widening spread signals declining quality grade — carcass weights at 947 lbs are down 1 lb from the prior week but remain 38 lbs heavier than last year.

FEEDER CATTLE CASH: Oklahoma City reported feeder steers 2.00-10.00 higher, with 600-lb weights up as much as 20.00. Weaned calves were 20.00 higher. Demand was described as good to strong.

BEEF EXPORTS: April beef exports totaled 89,783 MT, down 11% year-over-year, largely due to the China lockout. Excluding China, exports were essentially flat in volume and up 7% in value — demonstrating resilient global demand. Weekly export sales reported by USDA this week came in at 10,400 MT for 2026, down 45% from the prior week, a notable one-week drop.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

3. TOP 3 NEW DEVELOPMENTS

DEVELOPMENT 1: CATTLE ON FEED REPORT — PLACEMENTS SHARPLY BELOW EXPECTATIONS

The USDA June Cattle on Feed report, released after the close Thursday, delivered a notably bearish surprise on placements but a bullish signal on supply tightness overall.

Key figures:
- June 1 feedlot inventory: 11.7 million head, up 2% from a year ago (slightly below the analyst estimate of 2.5%)
- May placements: 1.70 million head, DOWN 10% from 2025 (analysts had expected only a 5.5% decline — a major miss)
- May marketings: 1.55 million head, DOWN 12% from 2025 (second lowest for May since the series began in 1996; analysts had estimated -10.6%)

The sharply lower placements signal that the pipeline of cattle coming to market in the months ahead will be tighter than expected, which is fundamentally supportive of cattle prices into late 2026. The marketing shortfall confirms what slaughter data already showed — packers are harvesting fewer cattle. Total weekly slaughter last week was 524,000 head, 36,000 below year-ago levels. This is one of the lowest non-holiday weekly slaughter totals in years.

DEVELOPMENT 2: NEW WORLD SCREWWORM — USDA COMMITS $105 MILLION, CASE COUNT HOLDS AT 12

The screwworm situation remains contained but commands serious federal attention. As of this week, 12 confirmed cases exist — 7 in cattle, 3 in goats, 1 in sheep, 1 in a dog — concentrated in south-central Texas with one case in southeast New Mexico. The most recent confirmed case (a sheep in Sutton County, Texas, detected June 12) is now listed as inactive. Critically, there are no detections in wild or feral animal populations and no positive fly-trap captures, indicating no established breeding population.

USDA approved 40 projects worth approximately $105 million to strengthen surveillance, sterile fly production, drone-based detection, wound-detection technology, and low-level insecticide applications. The agency reviewed 226 applications seeking $664 million before selecting the strongest candidates. This signals USDA is treating NWS as a long-term biosecurity challenge, not a short-term emergency. Mexico has banned live animal imports from the U.S. (a political gesture with minimal practical cattle market impact), and Canada has banned livestock imports from Texas (also minimal cattle industry impact). No restrictions have been placed on U.S. beef movement. Consumer messaging has been effective — no food safety concerns are circulating.

DEVELOPMENT 3: JBS CLOSES SOUDERTON, PA PLANT — PACKER CAPACITY CONTRACTION CONTINUES

JBS announced the closure of its Souderton, Pennsylvania beef plant, which employs approximately 1,700 workers and slaughters roughly 2,000 head per day. JBS is also closing a small value-added meat packaging facility in Memphis. These closures reflect the ongoing reality that packer margins are deeply negative and processors are scrutinizing every facility for efficiency. JBS simultaneously reaffirmed a $150 million investment in its much larger Cactus, Texas plant, signaling consolidation toward larger, more efficient operations. The Souderton closure primarily affects cull cattle from the eastern U.S. and cattle transported long distances from the Midwest. Regionally, supply will shift to other JBS facilities. This is part of a broader industry trend — tighter cattle supplies and compressed margins are forcing capacity rationalization, which will likely continue.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

4. OUTLOOK: WHAT RANCHERS SHOULD EXPECT

SUPPLY PICTURE TIGHTENING FURTHER: The May placements miss of -10% versus expectations of -5.5% is the most significant data point of the week. Combined with second-lowest May marketings on record, the forward supply pipeline is tighter than the market had priced in. This is structurally supportive for cattle prices in the August through December timeframe. Feedlot occupancy is declining, and large feeding companies are reporting smaller committed cattle pools — giving individual cattle owners more negotiating leverage at the cash window.

PACKER BEHAVIOR TO WATCH: Packers are cutting slaughter volumes in an attempt to rebuild box beef demand and improve margins. Retailers are reluctant to sell beef at a loss, which is slowing movement at the supermarket level. Watch for a response in box prices in the coming week. If the Choice cutout stabilizes or firms heading into summer grilling season, packer margins could begin a slow recovery — which would eventually support more aggressive cash bids.

SEASONAL DEMAND TRANSITION: The market is now past Father's Day, and traders are already pricing in some seasonal demand softness for premium middle meats. The Choice/Select spread widening to more normal seasonal levels confirms this transition. Ground beef and imports will dominate the demand story for summer. Ground beef retail prices came in at $6.75/lb in May CPI data, down 2.2% from April but up 12.8% year-over-year — consumers are feeling the pressure.

FEEDER AND REPLACEMENT MARKET STRENGTH: Recent rains across Oklahoma, Texas, and the southern Plains are refreshing forage and supporting grazing demand. Feeder cattle are trading sharply higher at Oklahoma auctions, with 600-lb steers up as much as 20.00 from the prior week. Placements into feedyards may slow further through June as grass conditions improve, which tightens the forward supply chain even more. This is favorable for cow-calf operators and stocker operators currently holding cattle on grass.

TRADE POLICY RISK: The USMCA renewal deadline of July 1 is approaching with significant uncertainty. President Trump publicly stated he would prefer no agreement, though he left the door open. Agricultural groups are pushing hard for a 16-year extension with duty-free provisions. A failure to renew or signal extension could disrupt North American cattle and beef trade flows. Ranchers with exposure to Mexican feeder cattle imports or Canadian markets should monitor this closely over the next two weeks.

NWS MONITORING: The screwworm situation is contained for now, but ranchers in Texas and the southern border states should maintain heightened vigilance. USDA's $105 million investment signals this threat is not going away. Producers should familiarize themselves with wound inspection protocols and reporting procedures. The Texas rancher experience from Tom Green County (Cole Covey) provides a useful real-world reference for identification and reporting.

DROUGHT UPDATE: Total drought coverage in the Lower 48 decreased 2.0% last week and is down 10.5% from a month ago. Heavy rains hit the Midwest and southern Plains. Tropical Storm Arthur near the southeast Texas coast as of this writing will bring additional moisture to the Deep South and Southeast. The overall moisture picture is improving for pasture conditions across key cattle country.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
BOTTOM LINE: Cattle owners retain leverage. The supply pipeline is tighter than expected, feedlot placements missed badly to the downside, and packer capacity is shrinking. Near-term futures volatility will continue around post-holiday demand uncertainty and basis adjustments, but the fundamental supply story remains bullish for producers through the end of 2026. Manage basis risk carefully and watch the USMCA deadline.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

DAILY CATTLE MARKET BRIEFING
June 18, 2026

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

1. MARKET SENTIMENT: MODERATELY BULLISH — Score: 6.5/10

Cattle futures posted back-to-back gains Monday and Tuesday, supported by firm cash prices, a cash-to-futures premium that made futures appear undervalued, and a boost from Wall Street optimism following a preliminary US-Iran ceasefire deal. Packer margins remain deeply negative (estimated loss of $227.75 per head Tuesday vs. $251.90 the prior week), which continues to suppress slaughter volumes and tighten fed cattle availability. Cattle owners retain leverage in this environment, though high retail beef prices and cautious consumer spending introduce demand-side risk heading into summer.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

2. KEY PRICE TRENDS

CASH CATTLE: Last week's trade settled at $255–$256/cwt live and $405–$407/cwt dressed, steady to down $3 live and steady to down $2 dressed from the prior week. Cash prices continue to carry a meaningful premium over futures.

FUTURES: CME August live cattle closed Tuesday at $249.200/cwt, up $5.950 on the day. August feeder cattle closed at $366.875/cwt, up $5.325. June live cattle settled at $255.300, up $4.675. Feeder cattle futures are up more than $9.00 over the past two trading sessions.

BOX BEEF: Choice cutout priced at $399.91/cwt Tuesday morning, up $4.86 from Monday. Select cutout at $377.99/cwt, up $1.58. The Choice/Select spread has widened significantly, with Select declining sharply over the past five to seven trading sessions — a more seasonally normal pattern.

RETAIL: May 2026 fresh beef prices averaged up 7.4% year-over-year. Ground beef hit $6.75/lb (up 12.8% YOY) and all-beef steaks averaged $12.80/lb (up 16% YOY). Fresh meat dollar sales rose 4.2% in May, but pound volume was essentially flat at -0.2%, signaling consumers are buying less at higher prices.

FEEDER MARKETS: Oklahoma City reported feeder steers $2.00–$10.00 higher, with 600-lb. weights up as much as $20.00. Weaned calves were $20.00 higher. OKC West saw steer calves $10.00–$20.00 higher and heifer calves $5.00–$15.00 higher. Demand described as good.

SLAUGHTER: Weekly slaughter of 524,000 head — 9,000 under the prior week and 36,000 under last year. One of the lowest non-holiday weekly slaughter totals in recent memory.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

3. TOP 3 NEW DEVELOPMENTS

DEVELOPMENT 1: NEW WORLD SCREWWORM EXPANDS TO 12 CONFIRMED US CASES

As of Monday, 12 confirmed NWS cases have been identified in the US — seven in cattle, three in goats, one in a dog, and one in a sheep. Eleven cases are in south-central Texas counties; one is in southeast New Mexico. Canada has banned livestock imports from Texas. Mexico has banned live animal imports from the US (largely a political statement, with minimal cattle industry impact). No restrictions have been placed on US beef movement. USDA has launched a 5-Prong Strategy for domestic readiness and response. While futures initially spiked on the news then sold off sharply, the market has since recovered. Critically, no consumer food safety concerns have emerged, and no headlines are pushing consumers away from beef. Historically, the 1960s eradication program provides a roadmap — Texas was the epicenter then as well, and the program ultimately succeeded, though it required years of coordinated effort.

DEVELOPMENT 2: USMCA TRADE TALKS RESUME WITH AGRICULTURE AT STAKE

US and Mexican negotiators met in Washington this week for a second round of USMCA talks covering agriculture and energy. Canada and Mexico represent more than $58.6 billion in US farm exports — over a third of all US agricultural exports globally. President Trump has publicly stated he is "not looking to renew" USMCA, though trade experts view this as a negotiating posture. A July 1 deadline will likely start a 10-year termination clock rather than produce a finalized deal. A third round of talks is scheduled for the week of July 20 in Mexico City. Agricultural groups warn that USMCA failure would be "catastrophic" for US agriculture. For cattle specifically, the ongoing Mexican border closure for live cattle (due to NWS) means more Mexican cattle are being finished domestically, which is reshaping regional beef trade flows and may reduce Mexican beef imports from the US while increasing Mexican beef exports.

DEVELOPMENT 3: JBS CLOSES SOUDERTON, PA PLANT — MORE PACKER CONSOLIDATION LIKELY

JBS announced the closure of its Souderton, Pennsylvania beef plant (approximately 2,000 head per day capacity) and a small value-added meat packaging facility in Memphis. While the direct industry impact is limited, this signals that packer margin pressure — currently running losses near $228/head — is forcing efficiency evaluations across the board. Analysts expect additional facility closures or consolidations as the industry adapts to structurally tighter cattle supplies. Regionally, eastern US cull cattle and long-haul Midwest cattle will need to be redirected to other JBS facilities.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

4. OUTLOOK: WHAT RANCHERS SHOULD EXPECT

FED CATTLE AND PACKERS: Tight fed cattle inventories give sellers continued leverage in the near term. Smaller feeding company occupancy levels and reduced committed cattle pools mean packers will need to be more aggressive in cash purchases this week. Expect cash bids to firm. However, packer losses near $228/head are unsustainable, and continued low slaughter volumes reflect their reluctance to buy cattle at a loss. Box prices are moving higher ahead of Father's Day and summer grilling season, which should help narrow packer margins modestly.

FEEDER AND STOCKER MARKETS: Feeder markets are strong and gaining momentum. Recent rains across Oklahoma and other key grazing states are improving pasture conditions and supporting grazing demand. The national feeder and stocker marketings for the week ending June 6 were 24.4% below the 3-year average — a stark reminder of structural tightness in cattle supply. Placement pace may slow further in June due to improved grass conditions. Ranchers with calves to sell are in a favorable position.

TRADE AND POLICY RISKS: USMCA uncertainty is the largest medium-term policy risk for the cattle industry. A deal collapse would disrupt beef export flows to Mexico and Canada — two of the top markets for US beef. Monitor the July 1 deadline closely. The NWS situation bears watching but has not yet created meaningful market disruption beyond the initial futures volatility.

WEATHER AND INPUTS: Australia's Bureau of Meteorology has warned of a potentially strong to very strong El Nino developing in the second half of 2026, which could bring drier conditions to key beef-producing regions globally and tighten international supply. Domestically, pasture and range conditions remain well below last year (32% good-to-excellent vs. 46% a year ago), though recent rains are providing some relief. Corn crop conditions are 68% good-to-excellent — slightly above last week but below last year — keeping feed cost pressures manageable for now.

BOTTOM LINE FOR RANCHERS: Cattle owners hold the cards in the short run. Tight supplies, recovering box prices, strong feeder demand, and improving pasture conditions all point in a favorable direction. The primary risks are policy-driven — USMCA negotiations and NWS containment — rather than fundamental supply-demand concerns. Producers with cattle to sell should remain engaged with the market and consider current price levels in the context of historically elevated values.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

DAILY CATTLE MARKET BRIEFING
June 17, 2026

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

1. MARKET SENTIMENT: CAUTIOUSLY BULLISH — Score: 6.5 out of 10

Cattle futures have posted back-to-back gains to start the week, driven by a combination of falling oil prices, firm cash markets, and a supportive equity backdrop. The Middle East peace agreement and the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz sent crude oil sharply lower — down roughly 5% for two consecutive sessions — which traders are interpreting as a consumer spending tailwind heading into the summer grilling season. Cash cattle remain at a meaningful premium to futures, suggesting further upside potential in the paper market. However, deeply negative packer margins (estimated at $227.75 per head lost on Tuesday), declining slaughter volumes, and a widening Choice-Select spread signal ongoing structural stress in the supply chain that tempers enthusiasm.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

2. KEY PRICE TRENDS

FED CATTLE — CASH
Last week's 5-Area weighted average settled at $256.08 per cwt live and $404.88 per cwt dressed. Late Friday sales in some regions reached $256 live and $405-$407 dressed. Cash prices remain roughly $5-$7 above August futures, keeping the basis wide and futures attractive to buyers.

FED CATTLE — FUTURES
August live cattle closed Tuesday at $249.20 per cwt, up 5.95 cents on the day. June live cattle settled at $255.30, up 4.675 cents. August feeder cattle closed at $366.875, up 5.325 cents. Both contracts are in a two-day rally but remain below technical resistance levels established in March.

BOXED BEEF
USDA priced Choice cuts at $399.91 per cwt Tuesday morning, up $4.86 from Monday. Select cuts came in at $377.99, up $1.58. The Choice-Select spread widened sharply to $17.37 per cwt versus $10.01 the prior week, reflecting tighter supplies of quality cattle and declining grading percentages.

FEEDER CATTLE — CASH
Oklahoma City feeder steers were 2.00-10.00 higher on the week, with 600-pound-weight cattle up as much as $20. Weaned steer and heifer calves were $20 higher. Oklahoma 8-market 700-800 lb. feeder steers averaged $373.97 per cwt, while Nebraska 7-market equivalents came in at $397.35.

FEED GRAINS
Corn at Omaha closed the prior week at $4.08 per bushel, down from $4.15 the week before and well off the $4.38 level of a year ago. December 2026 corn futures have fallen roughly 20% over the past month. The Guymon, Oklahoma basis is at a strong +$1.10 over the July contract, partly reflecting truck availability constraints tied to data center construction activity.

CARCASS DATA
Average carcass weights came in at 948 pounds, down 7 pounds from the prior week but still 40 pounds heavier than a year ago. Quality grade fell 1.0 percentage point to 87.6% combined Choice and Prime. Slaughter for the week was 524,000 head — 9,000 below the prior week and 36,000 below year-ago levels.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

3. TOP 3 NEW DEVELOPMENTS

DEVELOPMENT 1: MIDDLE EAST PEACE DEAL RESHAPES MACRO BACKDROP
A preliminary agreement to end the US-Iran war and reopen the Strait of Hormuz was struck this week, extending the April ceasefire by 60 days and allowing Iran to resume oil exports. Crude oil dropped approximately 5% on both Monday and Tuesday, reaching a three-month low. Lower energy costs reduce operating expenses for feedyards and processors while potentially freeing up consumer discretionary spending for beef purchases. Analysts caution that much of the immediate cattle futures move is psychological, as beef demand has remained firm throughout the conflict. Tanker traffic through the Strait is expected to normalize by Friday. Watch gasoline and diesel prices in the coming days for confirmation of the pass-through to farm-level input costs.

DEVELOPMENT 2: USMCA NEGOTIATIONS ENTER CRITICAL PHASE WITH AGRICULTURE AT STAKE
US and Mexican negotiators met in Washington on Tuesday and Wednesday for a second round of USMCA talks focused specifically on agriculture and energy. A third round is scheduled for the week of July 20 in Mexico City. The July 1 deadline will not produce a finalized deal but is expected to start a 10-year termination clock, during which negotiations continue. Canada and Mexico represent more than $58.6 billion in annual US farm exports and account for over one-third of all US agricultural export volume. Agricultural groups are warning that a failure to renew the agreement would be catastrophic. For cattle producers specifically, the ongoing closure of the Mexican border due to New World Screwworm has already disrupted feeder cattle flows. Mexico is now retaining cattle domestically for finishing rather than exporting them to the US, which is reducing available feeder supplies on the southern end of the supply chain. Any further deterioration in trade relations could tighten the replacement cattle pipeline and push feeder prices higher.

DEVELOPMENT 3: SHARPLY LOWER FEED GRAIN COSTS IMPROVE FORWARD FEEDING MARGINS
Over the past three and a half weeks, December 2026 corn futures have fallen approximately 20%, soybean meal is off 7.5%, and wheat has declined roughly 10%. These moves occurred ahead of the USDA Acreage report due June 30, suggesting speculative positioning rather than confirmed supply data. December 2027 corn settled last week at $4.68 per bushel. If these price levels hold or if cattle feeders lock in inputs at current levels, costs of gain could fall 10-15 cents per pound compared to the past five years. This improvement does not affect cattle currently on feed but has significant implications for the value of this year's calf crop and feeding economics into 2027. Colorado State University's Dr. Stephen Koontz notes that despite this favorable development, feeder cattle futures have barely reacted — particularly deferred contracts that would be fed on new crop grain — suggesting the market has not yet priced in the full benefit.

SECONDARY ITEM WORTH WATCHING: Australia's Bureau of Meteorology confirmed Tuesday that a strong to very strong El Nino event is now underway in the Pacific and could peak at levels not seen since 1950. Forecasters expect excessive rainfall in the Americas and hot, dry conditions across Asia. Australia, a major beef exporter, faces potential production disruptions. A strong El Nino could tighten global beef supplies and support US export prices, though it also poses risks to domestic forage and grain production in affected US regions.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

4. OUTLOOK: WHAT RANCHERS SHOULD EXPECT

NEAR-TERM (2-4 WEEKS)
Expect cash fed cattle prices to hold in the $254-$258 range as packers attempt to rebuild box beef demand by cutting slaughter volumes. Lower kill levels should firm up boxed beef values in the coming week, which would support cash bids. The Choice-Select spread widening to $17.37 is a positive signal for producers with high-quality cattle. Feeder cattle markets should remain firm, particularly for weaned calves, as summer grazing demand picks up following recent rains across Oklahoma and other southern plains states.

REPLACEMENT AND STOCKER MARKETS
Recent rains across the southern plains have improved pasture conditions and cooled temperatures, supporting grazing demand. Feeder and stocker cattle marketings for the week ending June 6 were 24.4% below the three-year average, reflecting the tightness in available supply. Placement pace is expected to slow further in June as grass conditions improve. Producers with cattle to sell into a strong feeder market are in a favorable position, particularly for weaned calves where premiums are running $20 or more above unweaned equivalents.

FEED COST OPPORTUNITY
Cattle feeders and backgrounders should evaluate forward pricing of new crop corn and other feed inputs at current levels. December 2026 corn near $4.08 per bushel and December 2027 near $4.68 represent a meaningful window to lock in costs well below the five-year average. The USDA Acreage report on June 30 will be the next major catalyst for grain prices in either direction. Speculative long liquidation has driven much of the recent decline, and a bullish acreage surprise could reverse some of the move quickly.

TRADE AND REGULATORY RISK
The USMCA renegotiation and the ongoing New World Screwworm situation represent the two most significant medium-term risks to the cattle supply chain. Producers sourcing replacement cattle from the southern border region should monitor NWS developments closely. Historically, the 1960s eradication program took years to push the pest back to Mexico, with Texas at the epicenter. Modern sterile fly release programs are more advanced, but disruptions to cattle movement could persist through the summer and fall. Watch for USDA guidance on movement restrictions and treatment protocols.

PACKER MARGINS AND SLAUGHTER PACE
Packer losses of $227.75 per head are unsustainable and will continue to constrain slaughter volumes. This is a double-edged dynamic: lower kills support cash prices and give cattle owners leverage, but retailers hesitant to feature beef at a loss slow consumer movement. The summer grilling season and Father's Day weekend should provide a near-term demand boost for middle meats. If box prices recover as expected with tighter slaughter, the cash-to-futures basis should begin to narrow, potentially capping further futures upside even as cash holds firm.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Sources: USDA-AMS Market News, LMIC, CME Group, Oklahoma National Stockyards, Colorado State University LMIC Report, Reuters, USDA-NASS, Oklahoma State University Extension

DAILY CATTLE MARKET BRIEFING
June 16, 2026

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

1. MARKET SENTIMENT: NEUTRAL TO SLIGHTLY BEARISH — Score: 4/10

Fed cattle prices ended the week steady to slightly lower, with live sales settling around $256/cwt and dressed sales at $405-406/cwt. Futures slipped Friday on long liquidation, lower boxed beef values, and the JBS plant closure announcement. Technical signals across live and feeder cattle contracts suggest the market has topped, with broken uptrends and resistance holding. However, sharply lower new crop feed costs provide a meaningful bullish underpinning for feeder cattle values into 2027. The market is caught between near-term packer pressure and longer-term supply tightness.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

2. KEY PRICE TRENDS

Fed Cattle (5-Area Weekly Average):
Live weight, all grades: $256.08/cwt (down from $256.53 prior week; up from $238.91 a year ago)
Dressed weight, all grades: $404.88/cwt (up slightly from $404.66; up from $380.05 a year ago)

Boxed Beef:
Choice cutout: $392.71/cwt (down from $393.62; up from $373.67 a year ago)
Choice-Select spread: $17.37/cwt — a dramatic widening from $10.01 last week and $12.46 a year ago. This reflects declining slaughter weights and lower grading percentages.
Carcass weights at 948 lbs, down 7 lbs from prior week but still 40 lbs heavier than last year.
Quality grade at 87.6%, down 1.0% week-over-week.

Feeder Cattle (700-800 lb steers):
Oklahoma 8-market: $373.97/cwt (up from $368.93 prior week; up sharply from $322.43 a year ago)
Nebraska 7-market: $397.35/cwt (down from $408.02; up from $346.92 a year ago)
Montana 3-market: $405.00/cwt (down from $415.46; up from $331.50 a year ago)

Oklahoma City auction: Feeder steers steady to $5 higher, instances $10 higher on heavier weights. Steer calves $10-20 lower amid extreme heat. OKC West steer calves $5-15 higher on improved rainfall.

Feed Grains:
Corn, Omaha: $4.08/bu (down from $4.15 prior week; down from $4.38 a year ago)
Corn basis, Guymon OK: +$1.10 over July futures — historically strong
New crop December 2026 corn down roughly 20% over the past month
December 2027 corn futures settled at $4.68/bu

Slaughter volume: 524,000 head last week, 9,000 under the prior week and 36,000 under year-ago levels — one of the lowest non-holiday weeks in recent memory.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

3. TOP 3 NEW DEVELOPMENTS

DEVELOPMENT 1: JBS CLOSES PENNSYLVANIA AND TENNESSEE FACILITIES

JBS USA announced the planned closure of its beef slaughter plant in Souderton, Pennsylvania (approximately 1,700 employees, near Philadelphia) and a value-added facility in Memphis, Tennessee. The company framed the closures as part of a broader modernization strategy, with production to be absorbed by other network facilities. JBS has made significant investments in Texas, Georgia, and Iowa over the past year. The market initially absorbed the news before packers lowered bids to $254, then $255, with later sales recovering to $256. The closures reinforce the ongoing consolidation trend in beef processing and further tighten already-reduced slaughter capacity. Packers continue to cut slaughter volumes in an attempt to firm box prices, which have been sluggish as retailers resist selling beef at a loss.

DEVELOPMENT 2: SHARPLY LOWER NEW CROP FEED COSTS IMPROVE CATTLE FEEDING MARGINS

Over the past three and a half weeks, new crop feed grain prices have fallen sharply ahead of the USDA Acreage report due June 30. December 2026 corn is down approximately 20%, soybean meal is down 7.5%, and wheat is off about 10%. Colorado State University analyst Stephen Koontz notes this has the potential to reduce costs of gain by $10-15 per hundredweight, with the full benefit flowing into cattle placed this summer and fed into 2027. Importantly, deferred 2027 corn contracts also moved lower, settling near $4.68/bu. This is a meaningful bullish signal for feeder cattle and calf values — though the USDA Acreage report on June 30 could reverse some of these gains if planted acres disappoint. Feeder cattle futures have not yet fully priced in this feed cost advantage, suggesting potential upside remains.

DEVELOPMENT 3: GULF PEACE AGREEMENT AND SCREWWORM LOGISTICS RESHAPE NEAR-TERM OUTLOOK

Markets responded broadly to an announced peace agreement in the Gulf, with oil and grain prices falling on expectations of restored shipping traffic. If confirmed, lower energy costs would provide additional relief on transportation and input costs for cattle producers. Separately, New World Screwworm case totals reached ten confirmed US cases, with the situation now transitioning from acute alarm to a managed, ongoing concern. Competing movement rules from state animal health officials are creating logistical complexity, but producers are increasingly treating NWS as a manageable health hazard with viable treatment options. Meanwhile, the border closure has redirected Mexican feeder cattle exports — Mexico is now retaining and finishing more cattle domestically, which will reduce the supplemental feeder supply the US has historically relied upon from south of the border.

BONUS ITEM: USDA SMALL PROCESSORS ACTION PLAN AND $60M IN FUNDING

USDA launched a Small Processors Action Plan and announced $60 million in fourth-round funding through the Meat and Poultry Processing Expansion Program (MPPEP). The plan aims to reduce regulatory burdens, improve FSIS support, and expand capacity at small and very small federally inspected plants. Applications are now being accepted. This is a longer-term structural positive for supply chain resilience, particularly relevant given ongoing large-packer consolidation.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

4. OUTLOOK: WHAT RANCHERS SHOULD EXPECT

NEAR-TERM (Next 2-4 Weeks):
Packers will continue to manage slaughter volumes downward to support box prices. With the Choice-Select spread blowing out to $17.37 and quality grades declining, the composition of the kill is changing — lighter carcasses and lower grading are tightening the choice supply. Retailers should begin featuring middle meats for summer grilling and Father's Day, which should provide some demand lift for the cutout. Watch box prices closely — a meaningful recovery here would allow packers to improve bids. Expect cash fed cattle to trade in the $254-258 range near-term.

FEEDER AND CALF MARKETS:
The collapse in new crop corn prices is the most significant fundamental development of the past month. Cattle feeders who lock in cheap 2026-2027 corn now can improve margins substantially. This should translate into stronger feeder and calf demand heading into fall. However, extreme heat across Oklahoma and Kansas is currently limiting auction activity and suppressing calf prices. Once temperatures moderate and pasture conditions improve — aided by recent rains across drought-stressed areas — demand should firm. Pasture and range conditions remain poor nationally at only 32% good-to-excellent, well below last year's 46%, which will keep grazing pressure on cow-calf operators and support feeder cattle movement.

STRUCTURAL CONSIDERATIONS:
The fed cattle supply backdrop remains tight and cattle owners retain leverage. Slaughter is running 36,000 head per week below year-ago levels. The JBS closures modestly reduce industry processing capacity, but production is being absorbed elsewhere. The USDA's push for small processor expansion is a multi-year story that will not provide near-term relief. The Mexican border closure continues to redirect feeder supply, removing a traditional buffer from the US market. Beef-on-dairy crossbreds are filling an increasing share of feedyard placements, particularly in Kansas and Texas, which is distorting traditional placement and grading data.

POLITICAL AND MACRO WATCH:
Trump's rural approval rating has dropped to 50%, its lowest level, driven by cost of living concerns including high food and fuel prices. This political pressure is sustaining administration focus on lowering beef prices — a persistent headwind for the market. The Gulf peace agreement, if it holds, could meaningfully lower diesel and energy costs for producers. The USDA Acreage report on June 30 is a key date — any upside surprise in planted corn acres could push grain prices lower still, further benefiting feeding margins.

BOTTOM LINE FOR PRODUCERS: Hold cattle if you have the capacity and forage — fed supplies are tight and the structural story remains supportive. Consider pricing new crop corn inputs now to lock in improved feeding margins for 2027 placements. Monitor the June 30 USDA Acreage report closely. NWS remains a management cost and logistical nuisance, not a market-moving crisis at current case levels.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Sources: USDA-AMS Market News / LMIC In The Cattle Markets / CME / The Cattle Site / Reuters / Oklahoma State University Extension / USDA NASS

DAILY CATTLE MARKET BRIEFING
June 13, 2026

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

1. MARKET SENTIMENT: MODERATELY BULLISH — Score: 6.5 out of 10

Cash cattle markets remain firm with cattle owners holding leverage in a tight supply environment. Fed cattle futures posted a third consecutive session of gains, narrowing the discount to cash values. The JBS plant closures introduced some initial uncertainty, but the market absorbed the news without significant disruption. Screwworm concerns are shifting from panic to managed response, removing a key source of psychological overhang. Tight fed supplies, favorable seasonal demand periods ahead, and strong consumer preference for beef underpin the bullish case. Headwinds include retailer reluctance to feature beef at a loss, softer beef exports, and ongoing packer margin pressure.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

2. KEY PRICE TRENDS

CASH CATTLE: Live cash trades settled at $255-$256 per hundredweight this week after packers initially tested $254. Dressed sales in the north moved at $405-$406. Cash continues to trade at a premium to futures, which is supporting board prices as convergence approaches.

FUTURES: CME June live cattle settled at 251.475 cents per pound Thursday, up 1.375 cents on the session — the third straight day of gains. August live cattle closed at 242.675 cents, up 1.175 cents. August feeder cattle surged 5.275 cents to settle at 359.650 cents per pound. Basis levels are tightening as futures re-converge with cash ahead of delivery.

BOXED BEEF: USDA choice cutout was priced at $393.21 per cwt Thursday, essentially flat on the week and below last week's peak of $395.86. The choice/select spread is widening as retailers prepare summer promotions around Father's Day and the Fourth of July.

FEEDER MARKETS: Oklahoma City reported feeder steers steady to $5 higher, with instances $10 higher on heavier weights. Feeder heifers were $2-$8 higher. Steer calves at OKC West were $5-$15 higher on good rains and aggressive buyer demand. Calf markets were softer at the main OKC barn, down $10-$20 on steers, with heat stress concerns limiting buyer enthusiasm for lightweight unweaned calves.

CORN: Corn prices have flattened but basis levels are moving higher. Guymon, Oklahoma corn basis is at +$1.00 over the July contract, driven by rising transportation costs linked to competition for trucking from data center construction activity.

SLAUGHTER VOLUME: This past week's slaughter was 533,000 head, up 85,000 from the holiday-shortened prior week but still 48,000 head under last year's pace. Weekly carcass weights came in at 948 pounds, down 7 pounds from the prior week but still 40 pounds heavier than last year. Quality grade was 87.6%, down 1.0% week over week.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

3. TOP 3 NEW DEVELOPMENTS

DEVELOPMENT 1: JBS CLOSES TWO U.S. FACILITIES

JBS USA announced the planned closure of its beef slaughter facility in Souderton, Pennsylvania and a value-added facility in Memphis, Tennessee. The company stated production will be absorbed into its broader network, with major expansions underway in Texas, Georgia, and Iowa. Markets initially absorbed the news cautiously before packers attempted to push bids lower, though cattle owners largely held firm. The closures reflect ongoing packer margin pressure in a high-cost, tight-supply environment and signal continued consolidation of processing capacity. Ranchers should note that fewer processing outlets generally support cattle owner leverage in the near term but raise longer-term concerns about regional market access.

DEVELOPMENT 2: NEW WORLD SCREWWORM — CONFIRMED CASES RISING, RESPONSE UNDERWAY

USDA confirmed nine screwworm cases in Texas and New Mexico as of Thursday, affecting cattle, a goat, and a dog. The agency has more than 100 staff working full-time on containment, has fast-tracked 13 emergency use authorizations or conditional approvals for treatments, and is accelerating $100 million in grant funding for new control technologies. Critically, USDA is deploying 100 million sterile flies weekly from a Panama facility, though officials acknowledge significantly more are needed. A domestic sterile fly production facility in Texas is not expected to come online until late 2027. The agency is also operating with 25% fewer animal health staff than at the start of the current administration. Canada has imposed a largely symbolic temporary ban on livestock from Texas. Oklahoma State's Derrell Peel notes the psychological impact has largely been one of relief — confirming the outbreak removes uncertainty and allows markets to focus on reality, which was already priced in. No food safety risk exists, and no major beef supply or trade disruptions are anticipated.

DEVELOPMENT 3: USDA ISSUES DIRECTIVE TO EXPAND GRAZING ON NATIONAL FOREST LANDS

Secretary Rollins announced a comprehensive directive to all U.S. Forest Service employees to restore and expand grazing access on National Forest System lands. The directive prioritizes filling vacant and closed allotments, streamlining permitting, maximizing grazing flexibilities, and giving ranchers stronger engagement with federal land managers. The action protects approximately 23,000 permittees and lessees who rely on public rangelands and builds on an October 2025 USDA plan to fortify the American beef industry. For cow-calf operators dependent on federal grazing permits, this represents a meaningful long-term positive for operational access and cost management.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

4. OUTLOOK: WHAT RANCHERS SHOULD EXPECT

NEAR-TERM (2-4 WEEKS): Cash cattle prices should hold firm or move modestly higher. Packers are motivated to build forward contract positions ahead of favorable summer demand periods — Father's Day and the Fourth of July — and slaughter volumes will remain constrained by processing margins. Cattle owners retain leverage as fed supplies stay tight. Retailer reluctance to feature beef at a loss remains the primary demand-side risk and is slowing supermarket movement. Watch for whether retailers begin promoting middle meats for summer grilling as the season progresses.

SCREWWORM WATCH: Producers in Texas, New Mexico, and surrounding states should be implementing monitoring protocols now. Treatment options are available and being stockpiled. The pest is manageable but will require diligence. The market has largely priced in the outbreak's existence; further futures volatility is more likely tied to the pace of spread than to the confirmed case count itself.

FEEDER AND REPLACEMENT MARKETS: Recent rains across drought-stressed areas of Oklahoma and the southern Plains are improving pasture conditions and supporting aggressive feeder buying. Placement activity into feedyards may slow through June as grass conditions improve. The USDA June WASDE confirms beef production is being lowered for 2026 on slow steer and heifer slaughter rates, with heavier weights providing a partial offset. Beef production for 2027 is being raised as reduced 2026 marketings build a pipeline of fed cattle for next year.

BEEF EXPORTS: Pork exports are surging while beef exports remain under pressure, down 11% year-over-year in April. The China market remains largely closed to U.S. beef despite diplomatic progress. Bright spots include Taiwan, Egypt, the Caribbean, and ASEAN. Beef variety meat exports are a notable positive, up 20% in April. Continued weakness in the Korean won, Japanese yen, and Southeast Asian currencies is a headwind for demand in those markets.

LONGER-TERM STRUCTURAL NOTE: Consumer demand for beef remains exceptionally strong. Per capita retail beef availability in 2025 reached 59.4 pounds, the highest since 2010, and real price increases have been more moderate than the previous supply-driven cycle of 2009-2015. The current price environment is demand-driven, not a supply crisis — a fundamentally healthier market condition for producers. Increasing calf supplies in the pipeline and the USDA's push to expand public land grazing access both point toward gradual herd rebuilding as the industry's next chapter.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Sources: CME settlement data, USDA AMS, USDA WASDE June 2026, USDA Drought Monitor week ending 6/9/26, Reuters, Beef Magazine, USMEF, JBS USA press release, USDA Forest Service directive 6/12/26.

DAILY CATTLE MARKET BRIEFING
June 12, 2026

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

1. MARKET SENTIMENT: MODERATELY BULLISH — Score: 7 out of 10

Cash cattle markets are holding firm at $256–$258 per hundredweight, and CME futures continue trading at a notable discount to cash values, creating upward pressure on futures. The June WASDE confirms strong Q2 cattle prices and projects steady pricing through year-end. Beef choice cuts are holding near $393 per cwt. The screwworm outbreak, while concerning, is being assessed by experts as a localized issue unlikely to materially impact national beef supply or food safety. Drought conditions are improving modestly, down 3.8% week-over-week and 7.8% month-over-month, offering some relief to ranchers in key cattle regions.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

2. KEY PRICE TRENDS

CME Live Cattle Futures (June front-month): Settled at 250.100 cents per pound on Wednesday, up 2.075 cents on the day. The August contract closed at 241.500 cents per pound, up 1.800 cents.

CME August Feeder Cattle: Settled at 354.375 cents per pound, essentially flat on Wednesday after strong gains Tuesday (+3.450 cents).

Cash Cattle: Slaughter-ready cattle trading at $256–$258 per cwt. Brokers expect steady to higher prices this week. Futures remain at a meaningful discount to cash, which analysts say is "just too much of a discount" — a phrase echoed by market analyst Cassie Fish — and is supporting the futures rally.

USDA Choice Beef Cutout: $393.28 per cwt on Wednesday, up 38 cents from Tuesday but below last week's peak of $395.86.

Feeder and Stocker Marketings: The week ending May 30 showed feeder and stocker cattle marketed at 37.8% above the three-year average, suggesting strong producer movement into the pipeline.

June WASDE Highlights: USDA raised cattle prices for Q2 2026 based on strong May prices but left the remainder of 2026 and 2027 unchanged. Beef production was lowered for 2026 due to slow steer and heifer slaughter rates, with heavier dressed weights partially offsetting the reduction. Beef production for 2027 is raised on expectations of more fed cattle available as 2026 feedlot placements increase.

Beef Exports: April beef exports fell 11% in volume year-over-year to 89,783 metric tons, largely due to the China market lockout. Excluding China, export volumes were up 0.3% and value rose 7%. Export value per head of fed slaughter reached $415.88, up 5% from a year ago.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

3. TOP 3 NEW DEVELOPMENTS

DEVELOPMENT 1: New World Screwworm Outbreak Escalates — Mexico Halts Live Animal Imports from US

The USDA has now confirmed seven screwworm cases across Texas and New Mexico as of Wednesday, affecting cattle, a goat and a dog. In a significant trade development, Mexico has suspended most imports of live animals from the US — including cattle, horses, pigs, sheep and goats — to protect its northern herds in Baja California, Chihuahua and Sinaloa, where no cases have yet been confirmed. Mexico has recorded over 28,200 screwworm cases since November 2024.

The federal response is ramping up: Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins announced $100 million in accelerated grant funding for new control technologies and confirmed more than 100 USDA staff are working full-time on the outbreak. The FDA has issued 12 emergency use authorizations or conditional approvals for screwworm treatments since last September, with drug stockpiles being built in Texas through partnerships with Elanco and Merck Animal Health.

However, serious concerns remain. The USDA is operating with 25% fewer animal health experts than at the start of the Trump administration, after a workforce reduction initiative. The sterile fly program — a key suppression tool — is producing 100 million flies per week from a Panama facility, but officials acknowledge that is well short of what is needed for full containment. A new Texas sterile fly facility is not expected to open until late 2027.

Oklahoma State University extension specialist Derrell Peel has offered reassurance: screwworm will not affect meat safety, will not disrupt national cattle supply, and is not a food safety issue. He characterizes the market reaction as one of "relief" now that the threat has materialized, noting the uncertainty had been priced in for months. Canada's temporary ban on Texas livestock is described as largely symbolic given minimal Texas-to-Canada cattle flows.

DEVELOPMENT 2: Cargill Fort Morgan Lockout Enters Third Week — Unfair Labor Practice Charges Filed

Teamsters Local 455 has filed unfair labor practice charges against Cargill after the company cut off pay and benefits access to over 1,700 locked-out workers at the Fort Morgan, Colorado beef processing facility. The lockout began after members rejected Cargill's last contract offer on May 19, following the expiration of the Local 455 contract on February 22.

The dispute carries broader implications for beef processing capacity and market supply. Cargill recently agreed to pay $32.5 million to settle a beef price-fixing lawsuit (while denying wrongdoing), and the Teamsters Food Processing Division has indicated it is investigating potential antitrust issues tied to the company's conduct. The Fort Morgan plant is a significant processing operation, and a prolonged lockout could add supply-side pressure to an already tight beef market.

DEVELOPMENT 3: UK High Court Rules FSA Slaughterhouse Inspection Charges Unlawful

In a ruling with significant implications for meat processing economics, the UK High Court has found that the Food Standards Agency has been unlawfully charging slaughterhouses in England and Wales for official controls. The annual cost of those controls is 64 million pounds (approximately $86 million US), and industry charges rose 24% this year. The court quashed the FSA's hourly rates for both official controls and enforcement. The ruling was brought by the Association of Independent Meat Suppliers and the British Meat Processors Association, with NFU support. While this is a UK-specific ruling, it underscores growing global scrutiny of regulatory cost structures on meat processors.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

4. OUTLOOK: WHAT RANCHERS SHOULD EXPECT

Prices: Cash cattle prices are expected to hold firm or push higher in the near term. The persistent futures discount to cash values suggests further upside potential in CME contracts as the market corrects toward cash. The June WASDE's confirmation of reduced 2026 beef production — driven by slow slaughter rates — reinforces a tight supply picture that should underpin prices.

Screwworm: Ranchers in Texas, New Mexico and neighboring states should be on high alert. Inspect livestock frequently for wounds and signs of infestation. The fast-tracked treatment approvals and federal stockpiling of drugs in Texas mean treatment options are becoming more accessible. The Mexico live animal import suspension is a near-term trade headwind but is not expected to cause major market disruption — the more significant ongoing issue remains the closed US-Mexico border for feeder cattle flows, which continues to constrain feeder supply rebuilding.

Drought: Conditions improved modestly this week, particularly across the central and southern Plains and West Texas, where summer thunderstorm activity provided some relief. However, long-term moisture deficits persist, and the West is forecast to remain dry over the next 5–7 days. Ranchers in drought-affected areas should continue to monitor forage conditions closely heading into summer.

Beef Exports: The China market remains the key variable. Plant registrations were renewed following the Trump-Xi summit, but additional obstacles remain before meaningful US beef volumes return to China. Excluding China, global demand for US beef is proving resilient despite tight supplies and record-high prices. A resolution with China would represent a meaningful upside catalyst for cattle values.

Labor and Processing: The Cargill Fort Morgan lockout bears watching. If it extends further, reduced processing capacity at that facility could create localized supply bottlenecks. Ranchers with cattle ready for market in the Colorado-Nebraska-Kansas corridor should monitor developments and consider contingency marketing plans.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Sources: CME/Reuters, USDA WASDE June 2026, USMEF, USDA Drought Monitor, UAC, Teamsters Local 455, OSU Extension, BMPA/AIMS, AnimalhealthEurope, ADM

DAILY CATTLE MARKET BRIEFING
June 11, 2026

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

1. MARKET SENTIMENT: CAUTIOUSLY BULLISH — Score: 6.5/10

Fed cattle supplies remain tight, cattle owners retain pricing leverage, and futures are trading at a meaningful discount to cash — a setup that historically resolves in favor of higher futures prices. However, headwinds from Mexico's live animal import ban, retailer hesitancy to feature beef at a loss, and creeping pessimism in replacement markets temper the outlook. The screwworm situation is transitioning from a headline shock to a managed operational challenge, which removes a layer of uncertainty from the market.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

2. KEY PRICE TRENDS

Fed Cattle Cash: Live trades this week in the north reported at $256/cwt live and $406/cwt dressed — roughly steady with last week. Cash market-ready cattle traded in the $256–$258/cwt range last week.

Futures Discount to Cash: Front-month June live cattle futures settled at 248.025 cents/lb on Tuesday, with August at 239.700 cents/lb. Both contracts are trading well below the cash equivalent of $250+/cwt. Analyst Cassie Fish noted the spread is "just too much of a discount," suggesting upward pressure on futures as the market corrects toward cash.

Feeder Cattle: August feeder cattle futures rose 3.450 cents to settle at 354.150 cents/lb. Oklahoma City auction reported feeder steers steady to $5 higher (instances $10 higher on heavier weights), feeder heifers $2–$8 higher. OKC West reported steer calves $5–$15 higher on strong post-rain demand. Calf markets were softer at the main OKC barn, with steer calves $10–$20 lower amid extreme heat concerns.

Carcass Weights: Current carcass weights at 948 lbs — down 7 lbs from the prior week but still 40 lbs heavier than last year. Year-over-year record weights continue to support quality grading.

Quality Grade: Combined steer/heifer grading at 87.6%, down 1.0% from the prior week. A slow seasonal decline is expected through summer, though historically elevated out-weights will keep grading high by historical standards.

Corn Basis: Corn basis in Guymon, Oklahoma has firmed to +$1.00 over the July contract, driven by rising transportation costs and competition for trucks from data center construction demand.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

3. TOP 3 NEW DEVELOPMENTS

DEVELOPMENT 1: MEXICO HALTS MOST LIVE ANIMAL IMPORTS FROM THE U.S.

Following confirmation of screwworm cases in Texas and New Mexico, Mexico's agriculture ministry announced a suspension of most live animal imports from the U.S., covering cattle, horses, pigs, sheep, goats and other species. Mexico cited the need to protect cattle herds in its northern border states — Baja California, Baja California Sur, Chihuahua and Sinaloa — where no confirmed cases currently exist. Mexico has recorded more than 28,200 screwworm cases since November 2024. This reversal of trade flow — where the U.S. had been awaiting reopening of the Mexican border for feeder cattle imports — adds a new layer of trade disruption. The near-term impact on U.S. feeder cattle supply is limited, but it signals that cross-border logistics will remain complicated and uncertain for the foreseeable future.

DEVELOPMENT 2: SCREWWORM CASES EXPAND GEOGRAPHICALLY — NOW AT SIX CONFIRMED U.S. CASES

USDA confirmed two additional screwworm cases as of June 8: one in a calf in La Salle County, Texas, and another in a dog in Andrews County, Texas — approximately 350 miles from the other confirmed cases. The geographic spread is notable. As of Tuesday, USDA had confirmed a total of six U.S. cases. Oklahoma State University extension specialist Derrell Peel emphasized that NWS will not affect cattle supply, beef production, or food safety, and that market impacts will remain primarily local. The futures market has largely priced in the NWS reality, with analysts expecting the focus to shift back to supply-and-demand fundamentals. Still, the expanding geographic footprint warrants continued monitoring, particularly regarding livestock movement restrictions.

DEVELOPMENT 3: CARGILL FORT MORGAN LOCKOUT ENTERS THIRD WEEK — UNFAIR LABOR PRACTICE CHARGES FILED

Teamsters Local 455 has filed unfair labor practice charges against Cargill after the company cut off pay and benefits access to more than 1,700 locked-out workers at the Fort Morgan, Colorado beef processing facility. The lockout has now extended into its third week following the expiration of the Local 455 contract in February and members' rejection of Cargill's last offer in May. The Teamsters Food Processing Division is also exploring potential antitrust issues connected to the company's conduct, citing Cargill's recent $32.5 million settlement in a beef price-fixing case. A prolonged disruption at a major beef processing facility adds to already tight slaughter capacity and could affect regional beef supplies and packer margins if not resolved soon.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

4. OUTLOOK: WHAT RANCHERS SHOULD EXPECT

FED CATTLE: Tight supplies and a significant futures-to-cash discount set up a constructive environment for cattle owners. Processors are hoping that Father's Day and Fourth of July demand will revive beef movement, but retailer reluctance to feature beef below cost remains a friction point. Expect slaughter volumes to remain dictated by packer margins. Weekly slaughter ran 533,000 head last week — still 48,000 under year-ago levels.

SCREWWORM MANAGEMENT: Producers in Texas and surrounding states should treat NWS as a new ongoing management cost rather than a market-disrupting event. Treatment protocols are available and effective. The psychological uncertainty premium in the market is largely resolved. Watch for any federal or state livestock movement restrictions that could affect your ability to sell or move cattle regionally.

FEEDER AND REPLACEMENT CATTLE: Recent rains across Oklahoma and parts of the Southern Plains are a genuine positive, reviving forage and supporting aggressive buying at auction. The week ending May 30 showed feeder and stocker marketings running 37.8% above the three-year average — a sign of active movement. However, a creeping pessimism is entering replacement markets tied to tight feeding margins and the longer-term decline in processing plant capacity. Producers should monitor feedyard placement economics carefully, particularly with corn basis elevated at +$1.00 in key feeding regions.

TRADE AND LOGISTICS: The Mexico live animal import ban is the most significant new logistics development. While it does not immediately disrupt U.S. beef exports, it eliminates a potential near-term source of feeder cattle from Mexico and signals that border trade normalization will take longer than markets had hoped. Canadian symbolic ban on Texas livestock adds minor noise but no material supply impact.

LABOR AND PROCESSING CAPACITY: The Cargill Fort Morgan situation deserves close attention. Any extended disruption at a major packing plant tightens regional slaughter capacity and could widen basis or create scheduling delays for producers in Colorado and surrounding states. Monitor for resolution or escalation at the bargaining table.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Prepared for distribution: June 11, 2026

DAILY CATTLE MARKET BRIEFING
June 10, 2026

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

1. MARKET SENTIMENT: CAUTIOUSLY BULLISH — 6/10

Despite significant headline risk from New World Screwworm (NWS), cattle market fundamentals remain structurally supportive. Fed cattle prices are holding near historic highs, feeder markets are mixed but generally firm, and tight domestic beef supplies continue to underpin producer leverage. The NWS situation introduces near-term uncertainty and volatility, but expert analysis suggests limited broader market impact. Score: 6 out of 10 (Cautiously Bullish).

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

2. KEY PRICE TRENDS

Fed Cattle (5-Area Live Steer): $256.53/cwt last week — up $30/cwt (+13%) year-over-year and up $25/cwt (+11%) from January 2026. Dressed sales in the north ranging $405–$410, with most $405–$407. Kansas late-week sales reached $258, creating a modest regional spread over Texas.

Boxed Beef: Choice cutout at $393.62/cwt, up slightly week-over-week. The Choice-Select spread widened sharply to $10.01/cwt from $5.76 the prior week — a significant signal of tightening quality supply.

Feeder Cattle: Mixed signals across regions and weights.
- 700–800 lb. feeders: Montana $415/cwt, Nebraska $408/cwt, Oklahoma $369/cwt
- 500–600 lb. feeders: Nebraska $528/cwt, Montana $515/cwt, Oklahoma $452/cwt
- Southern Plains (700–800 lb.) weekly average ~$384/cwt — approximately $90/cwt above year-ago levels
- Calves notably weaker at OKC: steer calves down $10–$20, heifer calves down $2–$8

Corn: Omaha cash corn at $4.15/bu — sharply lower on the week (down ~$0.28), providing modest cost relief for feeders. However, Guymon, OK basis is at +$1.00 over July futures, reflecting elevated transportation costs tied to data center construction demand for trucks.

CME Futures: August feeder cattle settled at $353.90/cwt; August live cattle at $241.65/cwt. Feeder futures briefly hit a two-week high before settling lower on profit-taking and technical resistance at the 100-day moving average.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

3. TOP 3 NEW DEVELOPMENTS

🔴 #1 — New World Screwworm Expands to Four Confirmed U.S. Cases
What began as a single confirmed case in Zavala County, Texas (La Pryor) on June 3 has now grown to four confirmed cases as of June 8:
- Two calves in Zavala County (6 miles apart)
- A calf in La Salle County
- A dog in Andrews County — approximately 350 miles from the original cluster, raising serious concern about geographic spread

USDA's APHIS has established 20-kilometer infested zones with quarantines, surveillance, and movement controls. Texas Governor Greg Abbott declared a state of disaster, calling for accelerated construction of a sterile fly production facility (currently not expected to be operational until November 2027). USDA has deployed 28+ field workers in Zavala County releasing sterile flies, setting traps, and inspecting livestock at highway checkpoints.

Key expert perspective (OSU's Derrell Peel): NWS is primarily a *local* management issue — it will not materially affect national cattle supply, beef production, or food safety. The psychological removal of uncertainty is actually a mild positive for futures markets.

🟡 #2 — Canada Imposes Temporary Import Restrictions on Texas Livestock
The Canadian Food Inspection Agency announced temporary import restrictions on livestock originating from Texas or that transited through Texas in the last 21 days. Analysts characterize this as largely symbolic — Texas cattle rarely flow directly to Canada in significant volumes, and Canada's climate is well outside the NWS survival range. However, it signals that trade partner reactions remain unpredictable and could complicate cattle movement logistics for affected operators.

The U.S.-Mexico border remains closed to live cattle imports (in effect since July 2025), and it is now uncertain whether the confirmed U.S. NWS presence will alter the political calculus on reopening. Feedlots in Texas, California, and Arizona are running at 84–93% of their five-year average capacity due to the prolonged Mexican import ban.

🟢 #3 — American Rancher Alliance Launches Producer-Owned Cooperative Model
A new organization, the American Rancher Alliance (ARA), founded by Casey Parker, is building a producer-owned cooperative aimed at reclaiming supply chain control from consolidated packers. Key features include:
- One rancher, one vote governance structure
- QR code traceability linking consumers directly to the ranch of origin
- Partnerships with independent processors and alternative distribution channels
- Target: national retail grocery shelf presence — not just direct-to-consumer niche markets
- Early retailer conversations already underway

This development reflects growing structural discontent among independent producers with packer consolidation and margin compression — and represents a longer-term market force worth monitoring.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

4. OUTLOOK: WHAT RANCHERS SHOULD EXPECT

Near-Term (Next 2–4 Weeks):
- NWS volatility will continue. Each new confirmed case — especially the Andrews County detection far from the original cluster — will trigger futures market swings. Expect sharp intraday moves on any USDA announcements. Producers in South and West Texas should implement immediate wound monitoring protocols and report *all* suspected cases to accelerate containment.
- Unreported cases are the critical wildcard. Industry analysts warn that underreporting in at-risk areas will be the primary obstacle to eradication. Summer heat will accelerate transmission and likely push the pest's range northward.
- Cash market leverage remains with sellers. Fed cattle supplies are tight, slaughter ran 48,000 head below year-ago last week, and packers showed buying interest despite lower futures. Sellers who held firm in Kansas earned $258 — patience continues to be rewarded.

Seasonal Demand:
- Father's Day and Fourth of July represent the strongest retail beef demand windows of the year. Processors are counting on this to support movement. Retailers remain reluctant to absorb losses on high-priced beef, creating friction in supermarket movement. Watch for feature activity to pick up as the holidays approach.
- Year-to-date domestic beef production is tracking more than 5% below year-ago levels while demand is at all-time highs — this structural tightness is the floor under prices.

Replacement/Stocker Markets:
- Feeder cattle prices are showing early softness at the calf end, with steer calves down $10–$20 at OKC amid extreme heat (heat indexes 100°+). Summer placement decisions will be heavily weather-dependent.
- Good rains across drought-stressed Oklahoma areas over the weekend provide some pasture relief, but new pessimism is creeping into stocker/feeder markets as feeding margins remain compressed.
- Corn's sharp decline (down 6.5% on the week) provides some feedyard cost relief, though elevated basis levels partially offset futures price drops.

Strategic Watch Items:
- Border reopening timeline with Mexico remains the single largest potential supply catalyst — any political movement on this front will be market-moving
- Sterile fly production capacity is the bottleneck in NWS containment; the new Texas facility must be accelerated
- Canada's import restrictions and any additional trade partner reactions deserve monitoring
- Carcass weights at 955 lbs. (40 lbs. above year-ago) and quality grades at 88.6% reflect heavy, high-grading cattle — heavy carcasses are already changing processor cut specifications (e.g., trimming ribeye lips)

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
*Sources: LMIC Livestock Monitor (6/8/26), LMIC In The Cattle Markets (6/9/26), Reuters, CME Market Reports, Oklahoma State University Extension, USDA-AMS*

DAILY CATTLE MARKET BRIEFING
June 9, 2026

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

1. MARKET SENTIMENT: CAUTIOUSLY BULLISH — 6.5/10

The cattle market remains fundamentally bullish on tight domestic supplies and strong beef demand, but the New World Screwworm (NWS) outbreak in Texas has introduced near-term uncertainty and volatility. Futures initially sold off sharply on the NWS news before recovering, reflecting the market's attempt to separate psychological fear from supply-demand fundamentals. Expert analysis suggests the outbreak is unlikely to cause major cattle supply or beef production disruptions at this stage, keeping the underlying bull case intact. However, widening quarantine zones, interstate movement complications, and the lack of a national animal ID system add meaningful operational risk.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

2. KEY PRICE TRENDS

Fed Cattle (Live): 5-Area Fed Steer averaged $256.53/cwt for the week of June 5 — essentially flat week-over-week ($256.86 prior week) but $20/cwt above year-ago levels (+8.4%). Kansas sellers who held out earned $258 late in the week vs. early bids at $255-$256.

Fed Cattle (Dressed): Northern dressed sales ranged $405–$410/cwt, with most at $405–$407. Prices ended the week steady to $1 higher.

Feeder Cattle: Mixed signals across regions and weights. Southern Plains 700-800 lb. feeders averaged ~$384/cwt in May — roughly $90/cwt above year-ago levels. Nebraska 7-market 700-800 lb. feeders came in at $408.02/cwt vs. $416.64 the prior week. Oklahoma 8-market was $368.93 vs. $379.47 the prior week, reflecting some softening.

Boxed Beef (Choice): $393.62/cwt — up slightly from $392.85 the prior week and $28/cwt above year-ago levels. Choice-Select spread widened significantly to $10.01/cwt from $5.76 the prior week, signaling strong demand for quality.

CME Futures: August feeder cattle settled at 353.900 cents/lb, reaching a two-week high before pulling back on profit-taking. August live cattle settled at 241.650 cents/lb. Futures hit resistance at the 100-day moving average.

Corn: Sharply lower — Omaha cash corn at $4.15/bu (down from $4.43 prior week), falling for a sixth consecutive session to its lowest level since October. This is a meaningful tailwind for feeder cattle values.

Carcass Weights: At 955 lbs — 2 lbs above the prior week and a striking 40 lbs heavier than last year. Quality grade at 88.6% — up 0.5% week-over-week, historically very high.

Weekly Slaughter: 533,000 head — 85,000 above the holiday-shortened prior week but 48,000 below year-ago levels, reflecting ongoing tight supplies.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

3. TOP 3 NEW DEVELOPMENTS

🚨 #1 — New World Screwworm Expands to Four Confirmed U.S. Cases
What began as a single confirmed NWS case in Zavala County, Texas (June 3) has grown to four confirmed cases as of June 8:
- Case 1 & 2: Young calves ~5.6 miles apart in Zavala County (South Texas)
- Case 3: A calf in La Salle County (South Texas)
- Case 4: A dog in Andrews County (West Texas) — ~350 miles from the original cluster, raising alarm about geographic spread

USDA's APHIS is establishing 20-kilometer infested zones around each detection site with quarantines and movement controls. Texas Governor Greg Abbott declared a state of disaster and is pushing to accelerate completion of a sterile fly production facility (currently scheduled for November 2027) before the next summer season. USDA has deployed 28+ workers across Zavala County releasing sterile flies, setting traps, and conducting ranch inspections.

Key complication: Without a national animal ID system, health officials cannot precisely define restricted areas, forcing broader — and more disruptive — movement controls across Texas. Producers in affected areas are reportedly reluctant to report cases for fear of quarantine, which could mask the true scope of the outbreak.

Market impact assessment (per OSU's Dr. Derrell Peel): NWS is primarily a localized management and cost issue — NOT a broad cattle supply, beef production, or food safety issue. No major market impacts are anticipated. The futures market's initial sharp sell-off followed by recovery reflects this reassessment.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

🇨🇦 #2 — Canada Imposes Temporary Import Restrictions on Texas Livestock
Canada's Food Inspection Agency announced temporary import restrictions on livestock from Texas or that transited through Texas in the last 21 days. Industry experts characterize this as largely a symbolic political move — very few Texas cattle are typically involved in Canada-U.S. trade, and Canada's climate is well outside the range where NWS can survive. However, the action highlights the international trade ripple effects of the outbreak and raises questions about whether other trade partners may follow.

The U.S.-Mexico border remains closed to live cattle imports (since July 2025), and it is now uncertain whether the confirmed U.S. cases will change the political calculus around reopening. Feedlots in Texas, California, and Arizona — which relied heavily on Mexican feeder cattle — remain at 84–93% of their five-year average on-feed inventories. Meanwhile, Mexican beef exports to the U.S. have soared in the first four months of 2026 as Mexican ranchers build out their own feedlot and processing infrastructure — a structural shift that concerns U.S. feedlot operators.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

📦 #3 — Beef Demand Enters Seasonally Favorable Window Despite Record Prices
Beef demand is transitioning into the historically strong Father's Day and 4th of July consumption period. Box prices stabilized last week with expectations for improvement in middle meats and steak cuts. However, two headwinds remain:
- Retailer reluctance to feature beef at a loss is slowing supermarket movement
- All-fresh retail beef prices are approaching $10/lb, testing consumer price elasticity

Year-to-date domestic beef production is tracking more than 5% below year-ago levels — a deficit that imports (primarily lean beef from Brazil and elsewhere) are partially filling through blending with domestic fat trim. Prime cuts are gaining grocery shelf space but require discounting to move. Heavy carcasses (955 lbs avg) are also changing processing specs — some processors are now trimming ribeye cuts to reduce steak size.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

4. OUTLOOK: WHAT RANCHERS SHOULD EXPECT

Near-Term (2–4 Weeks):
- NWS monitoring is now a daily operational reality for Texas producers and those in adjacent states. Expect widening quarantine zones, active checkpoints on major roads, and continued interstate movement friction. Producers should familiarize themselves with USDA's NWS Dashboard and APHIS reporting protocols.
- Futures volatility will persist around NWS news flow. Watch for updates on geographic spread — particularly whether the Andrews County (West Texas) dog case indicates a separate introduction point. Additional confirmed cases will pressure futures; containment news will support them.
- Cash fed cattle prices should hold firm with tight supplies and seasonal demand support. Kansas-style patience (holding cattle for higher bids) continues to be rewarded.
- Feeder cattle prices face mixed pressure — lower corn prices are a positive, but NWS uncertainty and softer replacement market sentiment are headwinds. Stocker and feeder prices have begun moving lower in some regions.

Intermediate-Term (Summer 2026):
- The sterile fly program is the critical eradication tool. Capacity constraints at the existing facility and the 2027 timeline for the new Texas plant mean the summer of 2026 will be the most vulnerable period for spread. Producers should not assume rapid containment.
- Fed cattle supplies remain tight and cattle owners retain leverage heading into summer. Placement activity is slowing year-over-year and will remain at the mercy of weather and pasture conditions.
- The

DAILY CATTLE MARKET BRIEFING
June 6, 2026

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

1. MARKET SENTIMENT: CAUTIOUSLY BULLISH — 6/10

The confirmed arrival of New World Screwworm (NWS) in the U.S. is the dominant market story this week, injecting significant volatility into futures while cash markets closed the week steady to slightly higher. The long-term supply tightening narrative remains firmly intact, but near-term uncertainty around disease containment, packer margins, and feeder cattle demand is keeping sentiment from moving decisively higher. The cattle herd remains at multi-decade lows, which continues to underpin price floors.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

2. KEY PRICE TRENDS

Cash Fed Cattle:
- Kansas live sales closed the week at $257–$258/cwt, steady to $1 higher after sellers held firm against early low bids of $255
- Dressed sales in the north: $405–$410/cwt with broader ranges
- Prior week cash settled at $256–$257 live, $405–$407 dressed

Futures (CME):
- After an initial selloff Wednesday (August feeders fell 5.80 cents to 342.625¢/lb), futures staged a sharp recovery Thursday
- August feeder cattle rallied 10.75 cents to 353.375¢/lb on supply-reduction concerns
- August live cattle settled at 241.525¢/lb, up 3.675 cents Thursday
- Week-over-week: June live cattle down $1.05 to $248.25; August feeders down $1.425 to $348.425

Cutout:
- Spot Choice cutout: $391.47, up $1.20 on the week
- Spot Select: $383.18, down $1.82 — Choice/Select spread widening
- Ribs and loins remain weak; grinds, trimmings, and end cuts holding strong

Feeder/Stocker Cash:
- Oklahoma City and OKC West feeder steers/heifers $5–$20 lower vs. two weeks ago
- Calf prices $10–$20 lower — heat, humidity, wheat harvest activity, and futures volatility suppressing buyer interest

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

3. TOP 3 NEW DEVELOPMENTS

🦟 #1 — New World Screwworm Confirmed in U.S. for First Time Since 1966
USDA APHIS officially confirmed New World Screwworm (NWS) in a 3-week-old calf in Zavala County (La Pryor), Texas. This is the first confirmed U.S. case in 60 years. Key facts:
- A 20-km movement restriction zone is in place around the case; checkpoints on all major roads out of La Pryor
- USDA Secretary Rollins states no additional cases have been detected and screwworm is not a food safety threat
- Sterile fly releases are being conducted aerially and on the ground ("flooding the zone")
- A Texas sterile fly production facility will not come online until late 2027
- Potential economic damage to Texas alone estimated at $1.8 billion if the pest spreads
- Mexican livestock imports remain blocked; U.S. ports of entry stay closed until further notice
- Elanco Animal Health has committed treatment resources to producers and veterinarians
- Market reaction was two-sided: initial demand-destruction fears drove futures lower; longer-term supply-reduction concerns drove a sharp rally the following session

📉 #2 — Packer Margins Deteriorating; Slaughter Running Below Year-Ago Levels
Weekly slaughter came in at 448,000 head — 84,000 below the prior week (holiday effect) and 40,000 below last year. Negative packer margins are increasingly unsustainable:
- Packers are expected to tighten kills further to attempt to recover box value
- Retailers are resisting featuring beef at a loss, shifting promotions to competing proteins during peak grilling season
- The Meat Institute has urged USDA to allow "low-risk" livestock movements (direct-to-slaughter) to ease supply flow restrictions around the screwworm zone

🌾 #3 — Feeder Cattle Markets Sharply Lower; Grain Basis Elevated
Replacement and stocker markets are under notable pressure:
- OKC feeder steers/heifers off $5–$20, calves off $10–$20 from two weeks ago
- Extreme futures volatility is chilling buyer confidence despite futures trading in the green
- Corn basis in Guymon, Oklahoma has risen to +$1.00 over July futures, driven by transportation cost increases (competition from data center construction demand for trucks)
- Drought monitor shows improvement in South/Southeast but expanding drought in northern Plains and upper Midwest — a concern for summer pasture and placement decisions
- Beef-on-dairy crosses are distorting placement data; USDA has not separated placements by breed, complicating supply forecasting

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

4. OUTLOOK: WHAT RANCHERS SHOULD EXPECT

Screwworm — Watch Closely, Don't Panic Yet:
Containment appears active and officials are cautiously optimistic about limiting spread from a single confirmed case. However, the sterile fly production gap (no new U.S. facility until 2027) is a genuine vulnerability. Ranchers in South Texas and adjacent areas should implement wound monitoring protocols immediately. Movement restrictions will likely remain in place for weeks. Mandatory livestock ID requirements will intensify as a policy discussion.

Cash Prices — Holding Firm Near-Term:
Cattle owners demonstrated pricing power this week by passing on low bids and being rewarded. With fed supplies remaining structurally tight and packer kills running below year-ago levels, sellers retain leverage. Expect cash to remain in the $255–$258 range in the near term, with upside possible if the screwworm situation remains contained and summer grilling demand materializes.

Futures — Elevated Volatility Ahead:
The screwworm story will continue to generate sharp intraday swings as traders interpret new developments. The market's two-day whipsaw (down 5.80 cents, then up 10.75 cents) illustrates the uncertainty. Producers with forward contracting needs should consider taking advantage of volatility-driven rallies.

Feeder/Stocker — Caution Warranted:
The sharp drop in feeder prices reflects a market recalibrating to tighter feeding margins and uncertain futures. With corn basis elevated and packer margins negative, the feeding sector faces a difficult summer. Producers placing cattle should stress-test breakevens carefully. Drought expansion in the northern Plains could limit summer grazing capacity and force earlier-than-expected placements.

Seasonal Demand — Key Catalyst Approaching:
Father's Day and the 4th of July represent the next meaningful demand catalysts. Middle meat prices (ribs, loins) need to recover for the cutout to build meaningfully. Record carcass weights (955 lbs, 40 lbs above last year) and high quality grades (88.6% Choice/Prime) are providing some offset, but heavy carcasses are already forcing processing adjustments on rib cuts.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

*Sources: USDA APHIS, CME/Reuters, Oklahoma City auction reports, USDA Drought Monitor, FAO Food Price Index, Beef Magazine market reports. Compiled June 6, 2026.*

DAILY CATTLE MARKET BRIEFING
June 5, 2026

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

1. MARKET SENTIMENT: CAUTIOUSLY BEARISH — 4/10

Markets are under pressure from multiple fronts: confirmed screwworm detection in Texas, volatile futures, weakening feeder cattle prices, and sustained packer margin losses. While fed cattle supplies remain tight and provide some floor support, the near-term outlook is dominated by uncertainty and downward price pressure across the supply chain.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

2. KEY PRICE TRENDS

Fed Cattle (Cash):
- Texas live trade opened at $255/cwt (down $2 from last week) before stabilizing at $256 across most regions, with some grid base prices negotiated at $257
- Dressed sales in the North: $405/cwt
- Carcass weights at 955 lbs — up 2 lbs week-over-week and a notable 40 lbs heavier than last year
- Quality grade at 88.6% Choice or better, up 0.5% week-over-week

Futures (CME):
- August live cattle: 237.85¢/lb — down 1.8¢ on Wednesday following screwworm news
- August feeders: 342.625¢/lb — down 5.80¢ (–1.66%) Wednesday; down from 348.425¢ Tuesday
- Futures showed some recovery Thursday as short-sellers exited positions tied to screwworm uncertainty

Feeder/Stocker Cash Markets:
- Oklahoma City: Feeder steers/heifers $5–$20/cwt lower vs. two weeks ago; calves $10–$20 lower
- OKC West: Steer/heifer calves $10–$20 lower week-over-week
- National feeder/stocker marketings for week ending May 23 were 31.5% below the 3-year average — a significant supply contraction signal

Corn/Feed Costs:
- Corn prices soft, but basis levels rising due to transportation cost increases
- Guymon, OK corn basis: +$1.00 over July futures — elevated input costs persist for feeders

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

3. TOP 3 NEW DEVELOPMENTS

🪲 #1 — CONFIRMED: New World Screwworm Detected in Texas
USDA's APHIS officially confirmed a New World Screwworm (NWS) case in a 3-week-old calf in Zavala County, Texas — the first confirmed U.S. case since 1966. Larvae were found in the calf's umbilical area. USDA Secretary Rollins clarified that earlier social media reports of a case "one mile from the border" were inaccurate; the nearest prior Mexican case was 25 miles away in Coahuila. Key implications:
- No immediate threat to beef safety or food supply
- Mexican cattle import suspension likely to remain in place, tightening feeder supplies further
- Calls intensifying for mandatory national livestock ID to enable targeted containment zones
- USDA has sterilized fly release plants under construction in Texas as a mitigation strategy
- Markets initially sold off sharply on the news; futures partially recovered as short-covering emerged

🌍 #2 — New U.S. Tariffs Proposed on 60 Nations (Beef Exempted — For Now)
The Trump administration's USTR proposed 10%–12.5% additional tariffs on imports from 60 countries under a Section 301 forced labor investigation, targeting Canada, Mexico, the EU, and others. Beef is explicitly exempted from these proposed duties, along with energy, pharmaceuticals, and certain agricultural products. However:
- Broader trade tensions continue to weigh on consumer sentiment and spending power
- Rising gas prices + tariff uncertainty = risk of demand erosion for premium beef cuts
- A separate 25% duty on Brazilian goods (digital trade practices) adds complexity to import beef dynamics

🇧🇷 #3 — China Lifts FMD Restrictions on All of Brazil
China's customs authority has recognized all of Brazil as foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) free, lifting longstanding regional bans. Brazil — the world's largest beef exporter — sends over 50% of its beef exports to China. This development:
- Opens the door to expanded Brazilian beef and pork exports (including bone-in cuts and offal) to China
- Could increase competition for U.S. beef in Asian markets
- China imported nearly $3 billion in Brazilian beef in Q1 2026 alone — volumes likely to grow
- Partially offsets any supply tightening from U.S. screwworm-related import restrictions

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

4. OUTLOOK: WHAT RANCHERS SHOULD EXPECT

Short-Term (2–4 Weeks):
- Fed cattle prices likely to hold in the $255–$258 range with tight supplies providing a floor, but packer margin losses will cap upside; weekly slaughter at 448,000 head is already 40,000 under last year
- Feeder and stocker markets face continued downward pressure — volatile futures are discouraging buyers, and the screwworm confirmation adds a new layer of uncertainty to cattle movements in Texas
- Expect increased USDA scrutiny and movement restrictions in South Texas; producers in affected areas should prepare for additional monitoring requirements and potential delays in cattle sales

Medium-Term (Summer):
- Pasture conditions are modestly improved (30% Good-to-Excellent vs. 29% last week, but well below 42% last year) — summer grazing programs are viable in many areas but remain below historical norms
- Corn crop at 67% Good-to-Excellent (near 5-year average of 69%) suggests feed costs won't spike dramatically, but elevated basis levels (+$1.00 in OK) will keep feeding margins negative
- Quality grade should begin a slow seasonal decline into summer, but record-heavy carcasses (955 lbs, +40 lbs YOY) will keep grading historically elevated
- Father's Day and 4th of July cookout demand should support middle meats and Choice box prices — watch for retail feature activity as a demand signal

Strategic Considerations:
- Mandatory livestock ID legislation momentum is building — producers should monitor policy developments that could affect compliance costs and movement protocols
- Brazil's expanded China access and rising U.S. beef imports (lean trim for grinding) suggest import competition will intensify through 2026
- Cattle owners retain leverage in a tight supply environment, but that leverage diminishes as calf supplies begin rebuilding in 2027 — locking in favorable forward contracts now may be prudent where basis allows

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
*Sources: USDA APHIS, CME Group, Oklahoma City Livestock Market, Reuters, USDA Drought Monitor, USDA NASS*

DAILY CATTLE MARKET BRIEFING
June 4, 2026

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

1. MARKET SENTIMENT: CAUTIOUSLY BEARISH — 4/10

Markets are under pressure from screwworm uncertainty, volatile futures, weakening feeder prices, and packer margin stress. The longer-term structural story remains bullish (tight supplies, herd expansion underway), but near-term headwinds are significant. Cattle owners retain some leverage given tight fed cattle supplies, but the feeding and packing sectors are increasingly squeezed.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

2. KEY PRICE TRENDS

Fed Cattle (Cash):
- Texas live trade early at $255/cwt (down ~$2 from prior week); bids of $256 passed; some grid base prices negotiated at $257
- Northern dressed sales reported at $405/cwt; live bids of $256 passed
- Carcass weights at 955 lbs — up 2 lbs week-over-week, and a striking 40 lbs heavier than last year
- Quality grade at 88.6% Choice/Prime — up 0.5% week-over-week; historically elevated

Futures (CME):
- Monday: August live cattle +1.550¢ to 240.600¢/lb; August feeders +3.125¢ to 351.550¢/lb (short-covering/technicals)
- Tuesday: August live cattle -0.950¢ to 239.650¢/lb; August feeders -3.125¢ to 348.425¢/lb (long liquidation)
- Futures remain at a notable discount to cash — a persistent tension in the market

Boxed Beef:
- Choice cutout: $392.83/cwt (up $1.36)
- Select cutout: $383.09/cwt (down $0.09)
- Box prices firmed early week; middle meats expected to improve into Father's Day and 4th of July demand window

Feeder/Stocker Markets:
- Oklahoma City: Feeder steers/heifers $5–$15 lower (instances $20 lower); calves $10–$20 lower
- OKC West: Calves $10–$20 lower
- Feeder & stocker marketings for week ending May 23 were 31.5% below the 3-year average — a dramatic volume shortfall

Grain:
- CBOT corn down 0.6% to $4.41¼/bu — favorable crop weather and ample global supplies pressuring prices
- Corn basis in Guymon, OK running at +$1.00 over July — transportation costs keeping local basis elevated despite soft futures
- Corn crop rated 67% good-to-excellent vs. 5-year average of 69%; planting 93% complete (ahead of average)

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

3. TOP 3 NEW DEVELOPMENTS

🦟 #1 — New World Screwworm: Rumor vs. Reality Creates Market Chaos
The week's dominant story. A Texas State Representative posted online that screwworm had been found one mile from the US border, rattling futures and feeder markets. USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins publicly refuted the claim, confirming the nearest verified case is a goat found 25 miles inside Mexico in Coahuila — with zero confirmed US cases. Despite the correction, market damage was done. The episode highlights how sensitive markets have become to this issue. The US-Mexico cattle import border remains closed, and any confirmed northward progression will extend that closure. Ranchers should expect continued screwworm-driven volatility regardless of confirmation status.

📉 #2 — Packer Margins Deeply Negative; Slaughter Running Well Below Year-Ago
Last week's slaughter came in at 448,000 head — 84,000 under the prior week (holiday-adjusted) and 40,000 under last year. Packer margins remain deeply in the red, creating an unsustainable operating environment. This is beginning to cascade into the feeding sector as fed cattle prices soften. Retailers are reluctant to feature beef at a loss, with competing proteins gaining shelf space during what should be peak beef season. The silver lining: tight supplies keep cattle owners with some negotiating leverage, but the structural stress across the supply chain is intensifying.

🐄 #3 — Herd Expansion Still in Early Innings; Highest Prices of the Cycle Ahead
Oklahoma State's Derrell Peel provides important structural context: beef cow culling has fallen to a record low 7.1% annualized rate in 2026, and the female slaughter percentage has declined from a peak of 51.8% (2023) to 48.8% — still above the 47% threshold that historically signals confirmed expansion. History suggests it may take another 6–10 months to cross that threshold, after which expansion typically persists for 14–49 months. The takeaway: cattle slaughter and beef production will continue to decline, and the highest prices of this cattle cycle are still ahead of us.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

4. OUTLOOK: WHAT RANCHERS SHOULD EXPECT

Near-Term (Next 30–60 Days):
- Cash fed cattle prices likely to trade in a narrow, choppy range around $255–$258. Futures discount to cash creates uncertainty for forward pricing decisions.
- Feeder and stocker prices face continued downward pressure from futures volatility, summer heat reducing buyer urgency, and wheat harvest pulling producers' attention away from markets. Expect additional softness.
- Screwworm headlines will continue to move markets on rumor alone. The border with Mexico remains closed to cattle imports, which provides some supply-side support to US cattle values but limits industry flexibility.
- Packer margins remain the critical variable. Deeply negative margins will constrain slaughter volumes, which supports cattle prices but creates broader industry stress.

Seasonal Factors:
- Father's Day and 4th of July should provide middle meat demand support for box prices in coming weeks.
- Summer grilling season historically favorable for beef demand, but record-high retail beef prices and softening consumer sentiment (rising gas prices) present real demand risk.
- Pasture conditions rated only 30% good-to-excellent vs. 42% a year ago — below-average forage quality will influence placement decisions and stocker demand through summer.

Strategic Considerations:
- Grid marketers should note that record-heavy carcass weights (955 lbs, +40 lbs YOY) are compressing traditional quality grade premiums — the abundance of high-grading cattle is flattening the choice/prime spread opportunity.
- Forward contracting: With futures at a discount to cash and uncertainty elevated, evaluate basis levels carefully before locking in summer and fall delivery cattle.
- Tariff environment: New US tariffs proposed on 60 nations (10–12.5%) and a 25% tariff on Brazil (excluding beef) add trade policy uncertainty, though beef has been carved out of most proposed duties. China lifting FMD restrictions on northern Brazil expands Brazilian beef access to China — a long-term competitive consideration for US exporters.
- Meat snacks: A growing $4.4B category (up 45% in 4 years) represents an expanding demand outlet for beef, though tight cattle supplies may benefit pork and poultry competitors in this space.

Bottom Line: The long-term bull case for cattle prices remains intact — herd expansion is just beginning, supplies will stay tight, and the highest prices of this cycle are likely still ahead. But the next several months will be turbulent, with packer stress, feeder market weakness, screwworm uncertainty, and consumer price sensitivity all creating near-term headwinds. Manage risk accordingly.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
*Sources: USDA market reports, CME/Reuters, Oklahoma State University Extension, CoBank Knowledge Exchange, USMEF*

DAILY CATTLE MARKET BRIEFING
June 3, 2026

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

1. MARKET SENTIMENT: CAUTIOUSLY BEARISH — 4/10

Cash fed cattle prices declined $1–3/cwt last week, futures are trading at a significant discount to cash, feeder markets softened $5–20/cwt, and packer margins remain deeply negative. While tight cattle supplies and resilient beef demand provide a structural floor, near-term price pressure is real. The highest prices of this cattle cycle are still ahead — but likely not imminent.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

2. KEY PRICE TRENDS

**Fed Cattle (5-Area Weekly Average — Week of 5/29/26)**
- Live: $256.86/cwt (down from $260.49 the prior week; up $27 vs. year-ago)
- Dressed: $405.19/cwt (down from $410.24; up $37 vs. year-ago)
- Late-week trade Friday developed at $256–257 live / $405–408 dressed
- Bids of $255 were unsuccessful; futures pushed south, widening the cash-futures gap

**Boxed Beef**
- Choice cutout: $392.85/cwt (up slightly week-over-week; up ~$28 vs. year-ago)
- Choice-Select spread: $5.76/cwt (widening from $3.53 prior week, but well below $11.71 year-ago)
- Box prices firmed early this week; middle meats expected to improve ahead of Father's Day and 4th of July

**Feeder Cattle**
- Oklahoma 700–800 lb. steers: $379.47/cwt (down from $384.42; up ~$63 vs. year-ago)
- Oklahoma 500–600 lb. steers: $483.81/cwt (up from $476.99; up ~$106 vs. year-ago)
- OKC feeder/stocker cattle 5–20/cwt lower vs. two weeks ago; calves 10–20/cwt lower
- Feeder & stocker marketings for week ending 5/23/26 were **31.5% below the 3-year average**

**Futures (CME)**
- Monday: August live cattle +1.550¢ to 240.600¢/lb on short-covering; August feeders +3.125¢ to 351.550¢/lb
- Tuesday: August live cattle retreated 0.950¢ to 239.650¢/lb; August feeders fell 3.125¢ to 348.425¢/lb
- Futures remain at a substantial discount to cash, creating a widening and concerning gap

**Feed Grains**
- Corn (Omaha): $4.43/bu — soft and declining; CBOT corn dropped further to ~$4.41/bu Tuesday
- 93% of corn crop planted (ahead of 5-year average of 92%); 67% rated good-to-excellent
- Corn basis elevated: Guymon, OK at +$1.00 over July contract due to transportation cost pressures
- Bearish corn fundamentals (falling crude oil → lower ethanol demand + favorable crop weather)

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

3. TOP 3 NEW DEVELOPMENTS

**#1 — New World Screwworm Case Found 31 Miles from US Border**
A new screwworm case was confirmed just 31 miles from the US-Mexico border — the closest yet in the ongoing outbreak. US cattle imports from Mexico remain suspended. While this provided a brief boost to feeder futures Monday, Tuesday's retreat showed the market is discounting the near-term supply benefit against broader demand concerns. Ranchers should monitor closely: any northward spread could have major implications for Southern Plains cow-calf operations.

**#2 — Herd Expansion Still 6–10 Months Away; Record-Low Cow Culling**
OSU's Derrell Peel confirms the female slaughter percentage currently sits at 48.8% — still above the 47% expansion threshold. Beef cow culling is tracking toward a record-low 7.1% in 2026. History suggests it could take another 6–10 months before the female slaughter percentage drops below the expansion threshold, after which expansion may persist 14–49 months. Bottom line: **cattle supplies will continue to tighten, and the highest prices of this cycle are still ahead** — but the market must absorb near-term margin pressure first.

**#3 — Tariff Developments: Brazil Carve-Outs and New Forced-Labor Duties**
Two significant trade actions emerged this week:
- The Trump administration proposed a **25% tariff on many Brazilian goods** (Section 301), but **beef is explicitly exempted** from both this action and the separate forced-labor tariff proposal covering 60 nations. This protects current beef import flows from Brazil, which are critical to the US grinding market.
- China simultaneously **lifted foot-and-mouth restrictions on all of Brazil**, opening broader Brazilian beef and pork access to the world's largest beef importer. This could redirect some Brazilian beef toward China rather than the US — a potential tightening of US import supply for lean grinding trim, which would support domestic prices for the cow/grind complex.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

4. OUTLOOK: WHAT RANCHERS SHOULD EXPECT

**Short-Term (Next 2–4 Weeks):**
- Cash fed cattle prices face continued pressure as futures remain at a discount and packers battle deeply negative margins. Expect slaughter volumes to stay constrained — last week's holiday-impacted kill of 448,000 head was 40,000 under year-ago. Post-Memorial Day beef counter clearance will be the key signal for whether box prices can recover.
- Feeder markets will remain volatile. Extreme futures swings are dampening buyer confidence at sale barns despite green futures days. High heat, humidity, and wheat harvest activity further limited OKC demand this week.
- The grid is changing: record-heavy carcass weights (953 lbs, up 38 lbs year-over-year) are flooding choice and prime supplies, narrowing quality grade premiums. YG 4&5 discounts are increasing. Producers on grids should review their marketing expectations accordingly.

**Medium-Term (Summer 2026):**
- Seasonal beef demand should improve through Father's Day and 4th of July, supporting middle meat values. June has historically been a strong beef sales month.
- Pasture conditions remain mixed: 30% of pasture/range rated good-to-excellent vs. 42% a year ago. Drought persists in South/West Texas and the Panhandle. Placement decisions this summer will be weather-dependent.
- Beef production is seasonally increasing but remains below year-ago levels. Prime grading at 16.99% vs. Select at 8.23% is compressing the Prime-Choice spread ($15.88 in May 2026 vs. $20.87 in May 2025).
- Beef demand remains structurally strong: retail beef holds 56% of all meat dollar sales, and consumers continue voting with their wallets despite high prices. Demand destruction has not materialized — yet.

**Strategic Watch Items:**
- Monitor the screwworm situation at the southern border closely
- Track post-Memorial Day beef feature activity and retailer willingness to promote beef vs. competing proteins
- China's opening to Brazilian beef could reduce lean trim imports to the US — watch import data for tightening grinding supply
- Corn basis elevation (+$1.00 in Guymon) may offset some feed cost relief from falling futures prices

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
*Sources: LMIC, Texas A&M AgriLife Extension, OSU Extension, CME/

DAILY CATTLE MARKET BRIEFING
June 2, 2026

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

1. MARKET SENTIMENT: MODERATELY BEARISH — Score: 4/10

Short-term pressure from post-holiday slaughter declines, falling cash prices, and packer losses dominate the near-term picture. However, structurally tight cattle supplies, record-low cow culling rates, and historically strong beef demand provide a bullish underpinning for the longer cycle. Monday's futures rebound on short-covering offers a small positive signal, but consumer spending concerns and record-high prices continue to weigh on sentiment.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

2. KEY PRICE TRENDS

**Cash Cattle:** Fed cattle traded Friday at $256–$257/cwt live, down $1–$2 from late last week and $3 below the bulk of last week's sales. Dressed sales at $405–$408, primarily $407, down $1–$3 week-over-week. The 5-Area weighted average for the week of 5/29 came in at $256.86 live / $405.19 dressed, versus $260.49 / $410.24 the prior week — and significantly above year-ago levels of $229.94 / $368.06.

**Boxed Beef:** Choice cutout at $392.83–$392.85/cwt, essentially flat week-over-week but up ~$28 from a year ago. Choice-Select spread widened to $5.76 from $3.53 the previous week, signaling some restoration of normal grade premiums after an unusual period of Select trading at a premium to Choice. Select fell $2.26 Friday to $382.32/cwt.

**Feeder Cattle:** Oklahoma 8-market 700–800 lb. steers at $379.47/cwt (vs. $384.42 prior week); 500–600 lb. steers at $483.81/cwt (vs. $476.99 prior week — a notable uptick in lighter cattle). Montana 3-market 700–800 lb. feeders at $412.00/cwt. All feeder markets remain dramatically above year-ago levels ($316–$338 range).

**Futures:** August live cattle settled Monday at 240.60 cents/lb (+1.55 cents), recovering from Friday's close of 239.05 cents. August feeders settled at 351.55 cents/lb (+3.125 cents) after Friday's drop to 348.43. Futures remain at a significant discount to cash, which is supportive.

**Corn:** CBOT corn dropped to $4.41¼/bu Tuesday, down from $4.43–$4.46 last week. Favorable crop conditions (93% planted, 67% good-to-excellent) and declining oil/energy prices are driving feed cost relief. Omaha basis at $4.43 Thursday. This is a meaningful positive for feeding margins.

**Packer Margins:** Packers losing approximately $266.90/head as of Thursday — an improvement from the prior week but still deeply negative and unsustainable. Holiday-week slaughter of 448,000 head was 84,000 under the prior week and 40,000 under year-ago.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

3. TOP 3 NEW DEVELOPMENTS

**🚨 #1 — New World Screwworm Detected 31 Miles from U.S. Border**
A screwworm case was confirmed in a six-month-old sheep in Mexico's Coahuila state — the closest the parasite has come to the U.S. during the current outbreak. With the U.S. cattle herd already at 75-year lows and beef prices at record highs, an incursion could cause an estimated $1.8 billion in damage to Texas' economy alone. Sterile fly production facilities are not yet online. This is the single most acute biosecurity risk facing U.S. cattle producers and is already boosting feeder futures on supply-tightening fears. Mexican cattle imports remain blocked. Ranchers in border states should review herd monitoring protocols immediately.

**📉 #2 — Herd Expansion Indicators Show Progress, But Peak Prices Still Ahead**
Oklahoma State's Dr. Derrell Peel reports that the female slaughter percentage has declined from a peak of 51.8% in 2023 to 48.8% currently — moving in the right direction but still above the 47% threshold historically associated with confirmed herd expansion. Beef cow culling is tracking toward a record-low 7.1% annual rate in 2026. However, heifer retention remains minimal. Historical analysis of the last four cattle cycles suggests it may take another 6–10 months to breach the expansion threshold, and that threshold must hold for 14–49 months for meaningful rebuilding. The bottom line: **the highest cattle prices of this cycle are still ahead.**

**🌽 #3 — Corn Prices Fall to Multi-Month Lows, Easing Feed Cost Pressure**
Corn futures dropped to $4.41/bu Tuesday on favorable U.S. crop weather (86–93% planting complete), declining crude oil prices reducing ethanol demand, and ample global supplies including a projected Ukrainian grain surplus of 50.8 million metric tons. DDGS in Nebraska at $179/ton, down from $181.86 the prior week. This is a significant tailwind for feedyard economics at a time when margins are already stressed. Lower diesel costs may also reduce feed transportation basis levels, which have been elevated. Corn at current levels is meaningfully below year-ago prices of $4.47/bu.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

4. OUTLOOK: WHAT RANCHERS SHOULD WATCH

**Near-Term (2–4 weeks):** Expect continued cash price volatility as packers manage deeply negative margins against tight cattle availability. Post-Memorial Day beef counter clearance will be closely watched — Father's Day and 4th of July demand could support middle meat prices and provide a seasonal lift to the Choice cutout. Slaughter volumes will remain constrained by packer economics, not cattle availability. Retailers are increasingly featuring competing proteins rather than absorbing beef losses.

**Grid Marketing Alert:** Quality grade premiums are being squeezed by an abundance of high-grading cattle — Prime is now 17% of the kill vs. Select at only 8.2%, and the Prime-Choice spread has narrowed from $20.87 to $15.88 year-over-year. YG 4&5 penalties have surged (now 25%/6% vs. 15%/5% a year ago). Producers marketing on grids should audit their genetics and carcass data carefully; traditional quality-grade premiums are largely eroded under current conditions.

**Strategic Positioning:** The structural case for cattle ownership remains intact and strengthening. Record-low culling rates, slow heifer retention progress, and the screwworm threat all point toward continued tight supplies well into 2027–2028. Falling corn prices improve the economics of holding cattle longer. Producers with leverage in the cash market should use it — forward contracting basis levels will reflect packer willingness to secure supply as the supply picture tightens further.

**Export Watch:** U.S. beef exports to the Caribbean hit record Q1 values (+27% to $102.7M). China suspended another JBS Brazilian plant over hormone detection — a potential longer-term opportunity for U.S. beef in Asian markets. The proposed 25% U.S. tariff on Brazil excludes beef, limiting direct trade disruption.

**Consumer Demand Reality Check:** Despite record prices, beef continues to command 56% of all retail meat dollar sales and is capturing ~75 cents of every new protein dollar spent. Demand destruction has not yet materialized at the aggregate level, though consumer sentiment risks and high gas prices bear watching heading into summer.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
*Sources: US

DAILY CATTLE MARKET BRIEFING
May 30, 2026

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

1. MARKET SENTIMENT: CAUTIOUSLY BEARISH — 4/10

Cash markets softened significantly into the Memorial Day weekend, with futures volatile and packers still bleeding red ink. Tight cattle supplies remain the structural bullish underpinning, but near-term pressure from the holiday-shortened slaughter week, demand uncertainty tied to fuel prices, and a leadership shakeup at Tyson Foods are weighing on sentiment.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

2. KEY PRICE TRENDS

Cash Fed Cattle: Light trade developed Friday at $256–$257/cwt live, down $1–$2 from late last week and $3 below the bulk of last week's sales. Dressed sales came in at $405–$408, off $1–$3 from the prior week. Packers leveraged the upcoming holiday-shortened week to pressure sellers.

Futures (CME):
- August Live Cattle settled at 241.00 cents/lb Thursday, down 1.5 cents after a brief Wednesday rally to 242.50 cents
- August Feeder Cattle settled at 353.025 cents/lb, down 1.6 cents
- The Feeder Cash Index remains elevated at $370+, with summer feeder futures $25–$30 back — a spread that makes feedlot economics deeply challenging (estimated -$150+/head at finish)

Boxed Beef Cutout:
- Choice: $392.32/cwt (down $2.40 Thursday after a $2.63 gain Wednesday)
- Select: $385.58/cwt (down $3.71 Thursday)
- Choice has re-established a premium over Select after an unusual extended period of Select dominance

Packer Margins: Processors were losing approximately $266.90/head Thursday, an improvement from the prior week's ~$299/head loss but still deeply negative. This continues to suppress slaughter volumes.

Weekly Slaughter: 534,000 head — 1,000 under the prior week and 42,000 under year-ago levels. Next week's holiday-shortened slaughter could fall below 450,000 head.

Carcass Data: Weights at 953 lbs, down 2 lbs week-over-week but 38 lbs heavier than last year. Quality grade at 88.1%, down 1.3% week-over-week. Prime grading has reached 15% of all fed cattle, diluting traditional prime premiums.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

3. TOP 3 NEW DEVELOPMENTS

🔴 #1 — Tyson Foods CEO Shake-Up Rattles Markets
Tyson Foods announced that board member Jeff Schomburger (former P&G executive) will replace long-tenured CEO Donnie King in October. Tyson shares fell 6% on the news. King had led a successful chicken business turnaround, and analysts expressed concern the leadership change creates uncertainty at a critical time — with Tyson's beef segment posting steep losses due to tight cattle supplies, and the company having already closed a major Nebraska beef plant and cut Texas operations this year. This adds another layer of instability to an already stressed beef packing sector.

🟡 #2 — Iran War / Strait of Hormuz Driving Fuel Price Volatility & Demand Fears
Oil price swings tied to conflicting signals about a potential US-Iran agreement and possible reopening of the Strait of Hormuz are whipsawing cattle futures. Wednesday saw a 3.35-cent rally in August live cattle on hopes of easing tensions; Thursday reversed on renewed demand fears. With beef already at premium prices, analysts warn that sustained high gasoline and diesel prices may erode consumer beef demand. The FTC has also launched an investigation into fertilizer price spikes (urea up 55%, nitrogen fertilizers up 33% since the Strait closed), adding input cost pressure across all of agriculture.

🟡 #3 — June Futures Delivery Convergence & Holiday Week Dynamics
As June becomes the spot delivery month next week, cash and futures prices must converge — the direction of that spread closure remains uncertain but will be a key market-mover. Packers successfully pressured the cash market this week using the shortened holiday slaughter week as leverage, despite the fact that they will need to purchase for a full week's kill in the period ahead. This dynamic could set up a near-term price recovery once the holiday passes, though packer margins must improve to sustain it.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

4. OUTLOOK: WHAT RANCHERS SHOULD EXPECT

Short-Term (Next 1–2 Weeks):
- Expect continued cash market softness through the Memorial Day holiday week, with slaughter likely below 450,000 head
- June futures convergence with cash is inevitable — watch for potential volatility as delivery month begins
- Packer leverage remains elevated with short kill weeks, but packers will need cattle for a full week's production — a potential floor under prices

Intermediate-Term (Summer):
- Demand catalysts ahead: Father's Day and 4th of July grilling season should support middle meat and ground beef demand
- Ground beef/hamburger demand is dominant and will increasingly rely on imported lean beef blended with domestic fat trim — watch import volumes
- Prime cuts are at par with Choice at retail — a market distortion that may correct as summer progresses
- Quality grades expected to begin a slow seasonal decline, though record out-weights will keep grading historically elevated

Structural/Macro Concerns:
- Feeder cattle replacement economics are deeply negative — feedlots face $150+/head losses projecting deferred futures to finish weights, which will slow placements and tighten future fed cattle supplies further
- The Tyson leadership transition, ongoing DOJ meatpacker investigation, and administration pressure on beef prices create policy and regulatory uncertainty for the packing sector
- Drought conditions expanded 1.6% in the past week, though recent rains have provided some relief to Kansas, Colorado, and the Southeast — pasture conditions remain a watch item for summer cow-calf operations
- Fertilizer and fuel cost spikes (Strait of Hormuz impact) are compressing margins across the entire supply chain

Bottom Line for Ranchers: The structural bull case — record-tight cattle supplies, strong underlying beef demand — remains intact. However, near-term headwinds from holiday-week packer leverage, fuel price demand fears, packer financial stress, and the Tyson leadership uncertainty suggest patience before forward pricing. The deeply discounted deferred futures make forward contracts unattractive. Basis contracts may offer the best near-term tool for those wanting to manage risk without locking in losses.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
*Sources: USDA Market Reports, CME, Reuters, HedgersEdge.com | Compiled May 30, 2026*