Forward hog markets continue to show strength

Forward hog contract prices continue to soar.

Paul Marchand is the senior risk management analyst with Hams Marketing Services.

"Seasonally, we've been seeing some really good value in the forward contracts, relative to history...From a historical sort of standpoint, we're looking at basically the highest forward contract prices that the market has seen compared to almost every other contracting timeframe on record. The markets have been very strong."

Meanwhile, daily U.S. cash markets started the week off on a lower note.

"We're still waiting for cash prices to make a seasonal turn. Most market participants are waiting for that turnaround to happen. The supply and demand fundamentals in the market has just meant that we can see a little bit of extra strength in the cash markets currently," said Marchand. "There could be a canary in the coal mine. The western corn belt is a region that we watch and typically it will lead trends higher or lower and it was down for the first time since about May last week by a significant amount in terms of dollars."