have some numbers and some questions:

1. The H&P report revised the 6/1/07 market hogs to +3.25%. The kill from 6/1/17 to 9/1/17 was plus plus 2.83%. Could that mean that 117K of hogs were backlogged at 9/1/17?

2. The H&P report pegged the 180# and up at +3.9%. The kill since 9/1/17 has been up 3.2%. Have another 84K of hogs been backed up since 9/1/17?

3. The carcass weights are +0.91# year/year. Is that confirming that producers have fallen behind in their shipments or have packers decided they are wanting to continue the trend of killing heavier and heavier hogs to achieve increased processing efficiency? In either event, heavier hogs means more pork.

4. The carcass primal cuts Friday were plus 0.88. Does that mean that demand has now decided we just saw the "Valley" in hog prices and it is now time to begin buying pork or was it just a "Dead Cat" bounce in front of the week end?

5. From the afternoon reports the model projects that the Purchase Index for Friday will be down -$0.95 and the component on Friday's kill will be down between -0.50 and -0.80. That will put the VVVs premium to the component by something like 1.50 to 2.00 and ZZZs will be premium by 6.00 to 6.25. If producers have strong numbers of heavier hogs, how probable is it that packers will choose to bid higher??

6. We are producing about 100 million pounds of pork a day. Freezer stocks at 8/31/17 were at about 576 million pounds. Is some of that frozen stock waiting to be exported? If someone is going to buy pork and store it for higher spring prices, will they buy now or wait thinking we may see softer prices?

7. At 12/31/16 freezer stocks were 477 million pounds. Is a decline in freezer stock the norm during October, November and December? I would have thought freezer stock would build in the fall.

8. Two new packing plants are coming on line. I am totally blind relative to where they are and what they are doing. Could they have some contracts to export a bunch of pork and they have been busy buying ZZZs so they can set their export prices?

I have shared with you a lot of numbers and associated questions but no answers.

The Hog Cycle was first observed shortly after the Civil War and it has occurred every four to seven years since. We now know that the "Peak" in the CME Lean Hog Index was posted on 6/26/2012 when it hit 103.08. The component has now been down every day for 32-days and tomorrow should make it 33-days. The average daily component drop has been 90.8 cents. Can you construct a very bullish scenario with these numbers?

I cannot.

I have chosen to be short the VVVs and ZZZs and have been well rewarded overall but the ZZZs pinned my ears back the last couple of days.

Best wishes,

dhm