This week, the hide market is expected to be quiet due to the beginning of a slow season for many leather tanning industries as well as the Labor Day holiday in China, which will close markets until Thursday. The US hide market begins the week with no change from last Friday’s trading ranges. Production in the US continues to be strong along with beef demand and high feed costs. Packer beef margins for the week were a positive $618.31 per head versus a positive $599.45 the week before according to HedgersEdge.com. 

The Jacobsen slaughter forecast for this week is 649,000 head, and if realized, will be 210,400 head more than the same week last year when it was 438,600.

Cattle slaughter finished last week 665,000 head, up 42 percent from a year ago. Over the next six weeks, slaughter is forecasted at an average of 643,200 head, up an average of 1 percent from the prior six weeks and up 22 percent compared to last year.

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