WEEKLY MARKET REPORT 

Week Ending 5th April, 2019

 AWEX Northern Micron Indices Comparison

SAME OLD, SAME OLD!!

The pattern of the last series kept going this sale as a minute fall of 4 cents for the AWEX EMI to 1943 was the end result. This was the 6^th sale in a row that saw a negative tone, the longest downward spiral (84 cents) since September 2012. The FRX was generally stable and has been trading in the range of 70.50 to 71.50 for 8 weeks. The MPGs had small losses, 17 micron and finer in buyers’ favour and broader than this lost 10 to 15 cents. As has been the case for several sales now fine, dusty, tender types bore the brunt of the falls while the good spec wools were rock solid. The volume of “best topmaking” fleece types was only 19% of the 21,500 bales on offer nationally with this figure down to 27% year to date compared to 43% the previous season illustrating just how much the drought is affecting the quality of the offering especially on the eastern seaboard.   

Skirtings also continued their cheaper trend as, like the fleece sector, only the very best fine micron, low VM types remained unchanged as the burrier, broader lots were 20 to 40 cheaper. Cardings fell again as the MCI in Sydney has given up 137 cents in the last 3 sales (1238 to 1101) as losses ranged from 20 to 60 cents for all descriptions in this sector. The only shining light was the Crossbred sector. Its stellar run since Christmas carried most microns to new record levels again adding 10 to 20 cents. From 25 to 32 microns increases have ranged from 185 to 350 cents since sale recommenced in January.

Talk of the market bottoming out over the past fortnight is yet to come to fruition. Exporters are still to find a comfortable level to trade the huge volume of drought affected wool that has and will continue to hit the market for a long time yet. While the merino types struggle XBs remain the flovour of the month as the above-mentioned figures show as more and more blending takes place between the 2 breeds as a means to cheapen up the final product. March testing figures from AWTA show little change in volumes as 3.7% less wool was tested this March compared to 2018. The progressive total for weight tested this season compared to the previous is 10.3% less - down from the June to December figure of 12%. If this status quo remains in play till June, 2019, this will give us 323mkg for the season which is well above the 308/312mkg estimate of last September. Export weight is tipped to be 2.45% less than last season as the average clip yield has fallen from 65 to 63% due obviously to the worsening quality of the clip as less clean kgs are exported. Well done to those clients who were lucky enough to be under last Friday’s storms, 65 to 110mm. Hopefully the next round of rain is more widespread and here soon. Market must be close to bottoming out soon, next week maybe???