Ethanol Blog

With some reduction in seasonal demand due to more cattle on pasture, coupled with plentiful supplies, prices of dried distillers continued on their downward march toward the lowest level in nearly four months.

Of the 30 Midwestern locations DTN collects spot prices from, 22 locations reported their spot prices had decreased between $5 and $15 per ton since last week. Prices remained unchanged since last week at eight locations and no price increases were reported.

The DTN weekly spot price average fell $7 in the past week, from $208 per ton last week to $201 this week. This makes the eighth consecutive week the average has continued on a downward trend, falling $35 per ton during that time, from $239 per ton the first week in April to $201 this week. This is also the lowest level the average has reached since the first week of February.

Merchandisers told DTN supplies of DDG are currently plentiful coming out of the long holiday weekend, while warm spring weather has greened pastures and resulted in decreased purchases of feed. With less demand, plants have to lower prices to move product.

Other contributing factors to the price decline are similar decreases in the corn board and China's continual balking over the MIR 162 trait.

The value of DDG relative to corn continued to drop, falling from about 122.15% last week to about 119.87% this week. The value of DDG relative to soybean meal dropped slightly as well, from about 41.48% last week to 40.33% this week.

The cost per unit of protein for DDG this week was $8.04, compared to the cost per unit of protein for soybean meal at $10.49.

Cheryl Anderson can be reached at Cheryl.anderson@dtn.com.

(CZ)

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