AUSTRALIA’s benchmark cattle price indicator has continued to fall quickly this week, with the results from yesterday’s Roma sale pushing the Eastern Young Cattle indicator down by 27c this afternoon.

At 4pm today the EYCI sat at 927.82c/kg carcase weight, which is down 50c in the past week, 90c in the past month, but still up 95c on this time last year.

The EYCI at closing August 4. Click to enlarge

The indicator passed below the 950c threshold for the first time since the big price rally started in early June.

Young heifers appear to be taking the biggest hit, with Meat & Livestock Australia’s restocker heifer indicator dropping 26c in the past week to 403c/kg. A sample of 964 restocker heifers, 200-280kg, at Roma yesterday dropped 24c to average 396c/kg. Lighter heifers stayed steady at a similar rate of 393c/kg.

According to National Livestock Reporting Service Roma reporter David Friend, the large yarding of 11,255 head came off the back of a continuing dry outlook.

“The overall quality of the yarding was mixed including larger runs of well finished bullocks and also larger runs of light weight and conditioned weaners,” he said.

“All the regular buyers attending which included an extra southern operator. The market however was easier by 15 to 30c/kg on most categories.” Some heifer categories fell by close to 100c/kg compared with the previous week’s sale (see full Roma report here).

There is a price gap emerging between the northern saleyards and southern saleyards as the seasonal flow of cattle pushes more Queensland cattle on the market.

Looking at the price contributions to the EYCI, Roma’s average price 868c/kg while yards further south like Tamworth, Gunnedah, Dubbo and Wagga were all above 1000/kg.

The numbers of cattle are vastly different, with Roma selling 6716 EYCI eligible cattle, while the above yards were all less than 1000. Dalby results are yet to come, however, more than 8000 were penned there today.

Cow prices staying steady

One market that is not dropping as quickly as the other is the market for heavy cows, with MLA’s processor cow indicator relatively unchanged since the middle of June.

The bigger numbers of those cattle are still coming from Qld, with several market reports saying southern processors are still active in the northern saleyards.

What is the EYCI?

The Eastern Young Cattle Indicator (EYCI) is the general benchmark of Australian cattle prices. The indicator is a seven-day rolling average produced daily by MLA’s National Livestock Reporting Service. The EYCI includes vealer and yearling heifers and steers, grade score C2 or C3, 200kg+ liveweight from saleyards in NSW, QLD and VIC. The results include cattle purchased for slaughter, restocking or lotfeeding and are expressed in c/kg dressed weight.