January 26

1/26 - In Friday’s monthly cattle report, the USDA said feedlot inventories on Jan 1st were 11.45M head, 3.2% below a year ago. New placements onto feedlots in Dec were down 5.4%. The biggest issue continues to be a lack of Mexican feeder cattle imports, which have been banned since Nov 2024 due to an outbreak of “new world screwworm” disease. Mexico accounted for 4% of our beef cows in 2024, and the import ban has left the U.S. short over a million feeders in 2025. Additionally, the USDA reported heifers made up 38.7% of feedlot inventories, indicating that females are still not being held back from slaughter for herd rebuilding. In Jan’s WASDE, the USDA said there was a 3.6% decline in beef production in 2025 and projected an additional 1.0% drop in 2026. USDA says cattle prices averaged $224.37/cwt in 2025 and projects $236.00 in 2026, both numbers shattering the previous record-high of $187.12/cwt in 2024.