Cattle Futures - Cattle Flat-Mostly Firm
US - CME live cattle settled flat to mostly firm on supportive spot-month fundamentals while technical resistance and spreaders who bought June and sold February and April trimmed front-months' earlier advances and propped up June.
12 February 2008
1 minute read
Live cattle contracts spiked on the open driven by fed cattle prices last Friday that topped $92.50 per hundredweight that triggered short covering Monday. February and April's upward momentum drafted deferred cattle contracts despite sullen CBOT corn futures.
Beef futures picked up additional ground after the U.S. Department of Agriculture's midday boxed beef wires showed choice cuts gained $0.52 per hundredweight and select items were up $0.49.
However, morning gains began to fade after short-term longs claimed profits and February and April ran into technical resistance obstacles. Furthermore, there were sentiments that some of last Friday's cash strength was already built into market.
And, February's pending Feb. 29 expiration, and the threat of deliveries, caused spot-February longs to sell February outright or look for opportunities elsewhere.
Source: FXSTREET
