02/21/05 A market holiday

Marketline February 21, 2005 Futures exchanges are closed today for the Presidents' Day Holiday as are USDA market reporting offices. That will delay USDA's reporting of export inspection and export sales reports this week. On Friday wheat futures were marginally mixed. The analysts say there just is no significant fundamental news for the wheat market so it remains at the mercy of technical and outside influences. On Friday, Chicago March wheat was up a half cent at 2-96. March corn up 3/4 at $2. Portland cash white wheat steady to firm at mostly 3-92. New crop August white wheat higher at 3-71. Club wheat 3-98. PNW HRW 11.5 percent protein 4-17. Dark northern spring 14% protein 4-90. Export barley 102 dollars a ton. USDA's Cattle on Feed Report issued Friday pegged the total feedlot inventory as of February 1st up two percent from a year ago, placements last month up seven percent and marketings even with January of last year. USDA analyst Shayle Shagum comments on the report. Shagum: "What we saw was probably more marketing than the trade was expecting. The trade was expecting about a 2% decline in marketings and what we saw were marketings that were about unchanged from last year. So there was some expectation that the on feed numbers for February 1st were going to be a little bit higher than they actually were." Ahead of the USDA report Friday, some fed cattle finally sold in the Plains at mostly 88 dollars on a live basis, one to two dollars below the previous week. Boxed beef was sharply lower again. Futures were lower too. April live cattle down 185 at 85-45. March feeders down 232 at 98-30. March Class III milk down seven cents at 13-66. I'm Bob Hoff and that's Marketline on the Northwest Ag Information Network.