Live cattle futures ended the Friday session 10 to 50 weaker in the front months. For the week, Dec fats faded by $1.35. The week’s cash price was mostly near $150 in the South and mostly near $153 in the North with $242 in the beef. Feeder cattle futures went home mixed, but mostly lower with a 20 cent gain in Jan offset by 15 to 22 cent losses in the other front months. Nov feeders ended the week with nickel loss, while Jan closed down by 75 cents from Friday to Friday. The CME Feeder Cattle Index from 11/03 was down by 64 cents to $176.99.  

Weekly Commitment of Traders data had spec traders adding near equal new longs and new shorts. That lifted their net long by 326 contracts, on a 12.9k contract OI boost, to 66k contracts. In feeder cattle, spec traders were 6,494 contracts net short as of 11/1. That came via a week of net new selling. 

Wholesale Boxed Beef prices from the Friday PM report had $263.75 for Choice and $231.90 for Select, after a $1.43 and $1.16 drop respectively. USDA estimated the week’s FI cattle slaughter at 667k head – down 1k head from the week prior but 15k head above the same week last year. 

Dec 22 Cattle  closed at $151.650, down $0.300,

Feb 23 Cattle  closed at $154.375, down $0.500,

Apr 23 Cattle  closed at $158.000, down $0.300,

Nov 22 Feeder Cattle  closed at $177.825, down $0.175

Jan 23 Feeder Cattle  closed at $179.625, up $0.200