US cattle futures end mostly lower

Benchmark live cattle futures on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) ended lower on Thursday for a third straight session as traders awaited a pickup in the cash cattle markets, but the thinly traded nearby contract hit its highest in almost eight years, reported Reuters. CME's spot February live cattle futures settled up 0.225 cent at 162.775 cents per pound after reaching 162.825 cents, the highest on a continuous chart of the front contract since April 2015. But most-active April cattle finished down 0.525 cent at 164.075 cents per pound. "Fat cattle (February futures) gapped higher this week, and they have been grinding higher into contract highs every day. And the rest of the board is just flopping around," said Dennis Smith, commodity broker for Archer Financial Services. "We are now trading all week long without direction from the cash market," Smith said, noting that cash cattle traded in bulk last week late on Friday afternoon, and a similar pattern seemed likely this ...