Sideways to Paris

The first two trading days of the week have been, well, a snooze-fest. Not much to report on the market front, aside from cheese prices taking a bit of a tumble. Everyone seems preoccupied with prepping for the SIAL in Paris, apparently quite content with their current positions—no one's rushing to buy or sell. Throw in today’s GDT, and we’ve got ourselves the perfect recipe for a sluggish start. The GDT results? Predictably dull, really. A bit of weakness in fat, mozzarella's struggling, cheddar's clinging on with some strength, and powders… well, they’re just flatlining. So, it looks like we’re coasting on these sideways prices right into Paris.

Now, for the liquid market: not much excitement there either. Cream prices are still riding high, but as some know, expensive cream on a Tuesday more than often means bargain cream by Friday. Looks like last week’s hesitant buyers are this week’s eager beavers. Cream prices are hovering around €9,800 to €9,900 for next week, with no fresh news on the other liquids just yet.

Butter: High Costs, Tough Sales

With cream prices where they are, butter sellers are still holding out for top dollar for October and November. But it’s getting harder to persuade buyers. Irish butter’s being whispered about at €7,000 fca Ireland for December—so if you don’t need the Dutch or German butter, there are cheaper options out there. The price discrepancies are wild right now. Polish sweet cream butter’s around €7,800, while fresh German lactic butter is fetching up to €7,650. Frozen Irish or Danish butter sellers, on the other hand, would be lucky to get anything above €7,400 DAP customer.

The GDT results for Solarec butter show the same market we see, for November, bids are getting in relatively high at € 7300, but in January prices didn't increase over € 6800,-.On the back of a weaker GDT we traded some volumes for Q1 at € 6750,- for NL/DE/BE butter. Bids are now coming in lower for NL/DE/BE and even sharper for Irish butter.

So, here we are, in a butter market that’s both tight and teetering on the edge. We’ve been bracing for a short squeeze for weeks now, but it turns out there’s more stock than anticipated. Still, with rising cream prices, October might just throw us a curveball.

Where to price the market opening is difficult to say, but we would expect it to open as follows.

NL/DE/BE

Period	Bid	Size	Offer	Size
October	€7350	88	€7400	88
November	€7100	88	€7200	132
Q1	€6700	132	€6775	66
Q2	€6300	132	€6900	66

Irish Butter

Period	Bid	Size	Offer	Size
October	€7100	44	€7400	88
November	€7100	132	€7350	88
Q1	€6500	132	€6900	88

Polish Butter

Period	Bid	Size	Offer	Size
October	€7200	44	€7750	88
Q1	€6400	132	€6900	132

Cheese: Where are the buyers

The cheese market is surprisingly weak. GDT mozzarella prices were right on the nose, hitting levels we’d been hearing from customers. At €4,200, there are plenty of sellers, but buyers are now aiming below €4,000 again. We’ve seen prices yo-yo by €1,000 in the past ten weeks. The big question now is, are we overcorrecting again to the downside here? With a tight liquid market, supply’s not increasing. So, is demand just incredibly soft, or are buyers playing hide and seek?

There’s a strong link between butter and cheese sentiment now. The question is whether weaker cheese trades will drag butter down, or if high cream prices will spur butter up and take cheese with it. We’re glad that’s not our bet to make.

Cheese Market Overview:

Gouda

Period	Bid	Size	Offer	Size
Nov-Dec	€4300	44	€4500	44
Q4	€4100	132	€4500	132
Q1	€3850	132	€4350	132

Mozzarella

Period	Bid	Size	Offer	Size
October	€3900	44	€4200	44
Nov-Dec	€3900	132	€4250	88
Q1	€3800	132	€4200	88

Powders: Still Yawning

On the powder front, no real drama. GDT results were a tad weaker than expected, but it aligns with the general sentiment out there. SMP took a minor hit of 1.8%, and WMP stayed flat. We’re trading at the low end of the SMP range we’ve been in all year, finding a bit of support around €2,300. Sellers are sticking to offers at €2,400, open to a slight nudge down.

We see sellers for powders as followed

Product	Origin	Volume	Period	Price	Incoterm
FCMP	IRL	88	Oct	4150	FCA NL
SWP	Spanish	150	Q4	900	FCA SP
D40	Spanish	200	Dec-March	975	FCA SP
SWP BB	Epiim	50	Oct	900	FCA NL
SMP Codex	Belgium	100	Oct	2400	FCA NL
FCMP Instant 2024 production	Irish	200	Oct-Nov	4050	DAP NL

We would have the following bids

Product	Origin	Volume	Period	Price	Incoterm
FCMP	IRL/BE	44	November	3900	FCA NL
SMP Nonstand	EU15	100	Oct	2400	DAP PL
SMP Choco Spec	EU	300	Q1	2500	FCA
SMP Codex	Solarec	300	Q1	2400	FCA