Market News

Cheese falls

Barrel cheese prices dropped on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange on Thursday, down 16.5 cents to $1.75 per pound. Blocks lost another 2.5 cents to close at $1.775.  Blocks have declined 16.75 cents for the week.  Ironically, Class III futures increased, November up 15 cents, December gained 14 cents.

 

National Dairy Products Sales Report for the week ending November 15; cheddar cheese blocks averaged $2.21 down 0.7 cents from the previous week. Barrels increased 5.9 cents to average $2.15 per pound.  Butter increased 3.5 cents to $2.00, nonfat dry milk decreased 2.2 cents to average $1.44 and dry whey decreased 0.4 cents to 64.2 cents per pound.

 

The Class I advanced prices for December: Base Class I Price is $22.53 per hundredweight, down $1.53 from the previous month. The Base Skim Milk Price for Class I for December $15.39 per hundredweight up $2.14 from the previous month.  This the lowest Base Class I price since February and the highest Base Skim price since June.

 

USDA reports 252,000 dairy cows were slaughtered under federal inspection in October, 14,000 more than in September and 25,000 less than went to slaughter in October of 2013. Year-to-date dairy cow slaughter totals 2.34 million head compared to 2.6 million for the same period a year ago.