Lotfeeders on Queensland's Darling Downs are looking at a trading loss of about $170 a head on cattle going onto feed this week, according to Beef Central's latest 100-day grainfed trading budget, calculated on Friday ahead of the BeefEx feedlot conference on the Gold Coast. Only the September 2025 budget, at minus $236, has been worse in the 15 years the series has run.

The budget's three key variables are all working against feeders. A typical flatback feeder steer ex Downs is priced at 520c/kg liveweight — down from a peak near 550c/kg a month or six weeks ago, but well above the 480c/kg quoted a year earlier — and feeder prices have not yet fallen in line with the drying season and a tough export meat market. AuctionsPlus quoted +400 kg feeders at 482–601c/kg on Friday, averaging 555c, most of them Angus-based southern cattle carrying a premium.

Ration prices at typical Downs custom feedyards are around $540 a tonne, close to the highest seen in 15 years, with some high-performance yards charging $560–570/t. Grain has risen $20–30/t in three weeks; Downs wheat was $430–440/t and barley $410–420/t last week, as dry weather clouds the new-season northern crop and southern grain is trucked north at diesel-inflated freight rates. Cottonseed is above $600/t and hay near record highs. A year ago the budget's ration price was $450/t — a $90/t gap worth about $140 a head over 105 days on feed.

On those inputs Beef Central puts total feeding cost at $846 a head ($705 a year ago) and total production cost, including the feeder, at $3,117 ($2,912). Cost of gain of 400–420c/kg against a 520c/kg feeder price makes longer feeding of lighter cattle look attractive, but large Downs yards say the trade-off is lower turnover — and with Queensland pens reported at 98.4 per cent utilisation in the June-quarter survey, few have the space.

The variables deliver a breakeven of 926c/kg carcase weight. Against that, export processors' forward contracts for 100-day cattle delivered in early January stand at 875c/kg, off a high near 900c earlier in the year as tariffs in China and the United States and a build-up of stock weigh on the outlook. On a 356 kg carcase the gap is $170 a head. A better performer gaining 2.2 kg a day instead of 2 kg cuts the loss to $72.

Whether the sums are already thinning feedlot intakes will not be clear until the September-quarter feedlot survey in mid-November. "Anecdotally, at least, Downs numbers on feed are not yet in decline, there is certainly resistance being seen and heard among feeder buyers," one feedlot contact said, adding that the growth of long-fed Wagyu programs blurs any trend in short-fed numbers. The budget assumes a 450 kg steer fed 105 days to a 356 kg dressed weight at 2 kg a day, 15 kg daily intake, a 7.5:1 feed conversion, $25 freight and bank interest, and is a comparison tool rather than a verdict on the sector. Jon Condon reported for Beef Central.

Source: Beef Central