A Senior Risk Management Analyst with HAMS Marketing Services says the uncertainty created by the Trump administration’s on again off again tariff war has had a minimal impact on live hog prices. Uncertainty resulting from U.S. President Donald Trump's threatened imposition of new tariffs on more than 75 of its trading partners has pressured futures markets but cash markets for hogs have remained stable.
Paul Marchand, a Senior Risk Management Analyst with HAMS Marketing Services, says for the most part the Canada, Mexico, U.S. trade agreement has protected the North American hog industry and, while there has been temptation among Canadian political leaders to duke it out with President Trump on Twitter, Mexico has been staying out of the tit for tat twitter fights, a credit to President Sheinbaum, and has indicated it will respond if it needs to respond.
Clip-Paul Marchand-HAMS Marketing Services:
The live hog pricing situation, and when we talk about a live hog, I'm going to speak specifically to market hogs that are being delivered to federally inspected plants that are destined for processing in Canada.Those cash prices have remained really resilient.It started off at a very high level relative to recent history and in fact marketing week one was the highest base price that we've seen on record for any marketing year and then it more or less followed a seasonal pattern.