Nice rally early today in lean hog futures that appears to be purely short covering. I'm simply not picking up anything early today that tells me this market is about to change its bearish stripes. Today's kill is estimated at 429,000 which is slightly larger than last week and would be above the year ago kill. Cash hog prices were lower yesterday and expected to remain soft for the remainder of this week. The cutout is a mess, quoted down $2.42 at $104.04. Wow. The cutout is quickly approaching the Aug low of $100.18, posted on August 27th. The only reason, perhaps, to buy hogs would be the sharp discount to cash. The latest cash index, declining daily, stands at 105.43. This might be a good enough reason to cover profitable shorts but not a good enough of a reason to go long....in my opinion.

DH, the only thing that worries me about our short trade is everyone else is negative hogs and they are up! I just put another order in on Feb hogs at 87.85, will see what the day brings!
Dewey