Cash cheese slid again on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange on Wednesday, blocks down another 6.5 cents to close at $1.6925 while barrels fell 5 cents to $1.73. The final price in both cases was set by actual sales; there were lower unfilled bids for each. In the last week, blocks have lost 31 cents, barrels are down 40 cents while the October through December Class III contracts have lost an average 90 cents per hundred.
Dairy Market News says cheese buyers are tempted to jump it and take advantage of the lower prices but most are holding off, waiting to see if the prices will go any lower. Export interest is also picking up prompted by the lower prices. There are still strong indications that there really is not a lot of cheese available in the Midwest and Northeast as contract sales are clearing the bulk of current cheese production…anything extra is coming out of the West where the cows had a much-more-pleasant summer.
The market is still trying to deal with the cold storage report on Monday showing total cheese stocks increasing 3 percent in July and American type stocks increased 5 percent. Both groups are 1 percent larger than a year ago. After American cheese stocks held steady in May and June, the July increase was a disappointment. This comes on top of last week’s July milk production report showing a slight increase in overall U.S. production as the West more than covered the heat-related losses in the Midwest and Northeast.
