With the slow rebuilding of the U.S. cattle herd confirmed in the USDA cattle inventory report there’s optimism about strong cattle prices lasting through 2026 and beyond.
Record Cattle Prices Again in 2026?
Don Close, senior animal protein analyst with Terrain, says the cattle futures may retest last October’s all-time high prices yet this year.
He says, “Our view is clearly that we have another round of record high prices in this market for 2026.”
Close is predicting $255 to $265 fed cattle prices as the market will get into the tightest numbers in mid-2026.
“We’ve got six solid months of reduced placements here with no indications that they’re ready to increase,” he explains. “I think that real crunch time is going to be late second, even into early third quarter, we’ll be still seeing extremely tight supplies.”
Consumer Demand Driving Record Cattle Prices
However, Close says also driving that price outlook is the fact that consumers have not seen sticker shock with the record retail beef prices in the store.
“We’re not seeing any slowdown in demand at all,” he explains. “The seasonality of the market muddies this a little bit, but could you see those shifts in individual cuts of beef affecting demand?Overall, right now we don’t think so.”
Close says U.S. consumers, are not trading down proteins either so he predicts that consumer beef demand will stay strong through 2026.
Consumer Demand Metrics
Dave Weaber, senior research analyst animal protein for Terrain, says they have been measuring real per capita expenditures on a monthly basis for the last three years.
“In November was record large spending by U.S. consumers on beef products at retail and as we’ve gone through and looked at demand, we had record beef demand in November,” he explains.
Weaber says consumer demand is driving the record beef prices in the store as much as the supply picture. He adds consumers do have a choice and they are voting with their dollars.
“And they chose our product because it’s a great eating experience, it’s convenient, all the attributes we’ve added to it in terms of quality grade and meeting consumers where they’re at in terms of what they’re looking for for their protein source. We’ve hit home run on every account,” he stresses.
Imports May Ease Retail Beef Prices Slightly
Attempts by President Trump to lower beef inflation for consumers may get a little help from an increase in beef imports to start the year as the Tariff Rate Quotas have restarted for Brazil and Argentina.
Close says, “It’s going to have an impact, certainly on that ground beef market that consumers need some help with. But even that won’t have much of a dampening effect on the prices cattle producers receive.”
Weaber joined Chip Flory on AgriTalk Wednesday morning discussing quarterly market outlooks, TerrainAg’s recent survey and the beef industry as a whole.
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