Cattle Futures: Live Cattle Mostly Down; Hogs Up
US - Chicago Mercantile Exchange live cattle and feeder cattle futures Tuesday were the victims of choppy trading in other commodity markets since corn's leadership role declined for the day, market analysts and traders said.
4 April 2007
1 minute read
Lean hog futures rebounded from a midday slump to end higher in all months, while bellies closed narrowly mixed.
Corn futures prices opened higher and ended lower but lacked the pressure to sell that came in after the U.S. Department of Agriculture's prospective plantings report Friday, traders and brokers said. This kept some of the investors out of the early cattle market that had pushed prices as corn came down, allowing sellers to pressure the market early.
Cattle futures also came under pressure as investors took short-term long profits, a floor trader said. Margin call selling also may have been a factor in investor selling in live cattle and feeder cattle on Tuesday.
Index funds were said to be following markets such as crude oil and gold, which were more volatile, and trading orders tend to blanket the whole commodity fund portfolio, one trader said.
