5/8/19 was down -0.09 to 85.72. The MMMs are now trading premium to the component by +6.95.

The 6-day moving average carcass weight firmed to 215.20#. That is +1.07# yr/yr. Index hogs were lighter at 214.15# which was also a bit heavier. Packer hogs were heavier than the non-packer hogs by 3.06#. Not very long ago packer hogs were more than four pounds heavier than the non-packer hogs. As packers have been uping their kill for the Memorial Day cookout trade, packers appear to have been liquidating some of their market hogs.

I am sure you have noticed that today has been a crazy, wild day in the hog market going from essentially limit down across the board to up a point or two in some of the contracts. This has caused the calendar spreads to be all over the place and I have been busy loading and unloading my boat with the calendar spreads. I have had a bunch of long M/Ns but was able to take profits on six today. Some of the other spreads kept me busy piling them on and taking them off with a couple of V/Zs going on and off.

I believe today's hog action was strongly driven by the Trump/Xi trade war spat. The fact remains that Chine has an ASF problem that will probably result in the loss of 20% to 30% of their sows and that will be a large percentage of the world's pork production capability. Most likely this will result in China importing a lot of pork. Whether it is U.S. pork or pork from other nations, it will tend to move the price of world pork up. So I took a bravery pill and bought an August 20 at limit down and when the MMMs rallied, I sold a scalper I bought on yesterday's dip. It is doubtful that I "Cut my melon" but my margin should end the day higher than it began. There was a time today when I didn't think that would happen.

Now I need to go look at the export sales report from this morning.

Best wishes,

Doc