12/31/14 was UP +0.16 TO 78.20. That was consistent with my bias that the CME Index would rise enough to close the "Gap" and possibly push the GGGs up a bit. It was not in harmony with the Hog Pricing Model's projection of the daily change. It's a real challenge to know which price-mix of hogs packers will kill when they have been buying them on a rapidly changing price scale. Overall, though, I feel the Hog Pricing Model is a fairly good trading tool especially when we begin to get close to cash settlement.

As expected, the holidays seem to be backing hogs up a bit and the 6-day moving average carcass weight moved up to 216.75#. That is + 2.20# yr/yr. It was especially the packer hogs that were heavier and the percentage of the kill that was made up of packer hogs was also a bit higher than usual at nearly 35%.

The Feb cattle/hog spread continues to be chaotic. I'm still short from 84.25 but was not brave enough to scale in with a second one quite yet. But it looks like I should have!

Best wishes,

dhm