Good afternoon and welcome to Markets Desk.
In the livestock complex, lean hog futures closed mostly higher Thursday, with most contracts finishing steady to ninety cents in the green, though the June contract slipped sixty-two cents. The USDA national base hog price came in at ninety-three dollars and sixty-four cents, down a dollar from Wednesday, and the CME Lean Hog Index edged lower as well, suggesting some near-term softness in the cash market beneath the futures strength.
Cattle told a different story. Live cattle futures closed in the red across the board, with losses ranging from fifty-two cents to one dollar and sixty-seven cents on the session. Cash trade remained thin, with bids coming in around two hundred fifty-three dollars — well below last week's range of two hundred sixty to two hundred sixty-five dollars nationally. That spread between bids and last week's prints signals feedlots and packers are still feeling each other out.
Turning to equities, with earnings season winding down, traders are watching a handful of names flagged for what analysts are calling sawtooth volatility next week — sharp, jagged price swings in both directions. The S&P five hundred is holding constructive technically, but the options market is pricing in outsized moves for at least seven individual names, making position sizing and timing critical for active traders heading into the week.
That's the tape. Markets Desk, signing off the floor.
