Prices fell on Tuesday for the third GlobalDairyTrade auction in a row, this time by 3.9%.
The dip took to 12.5% the total drop over the three auctions in the GlobalDairyTrade index, which fell to a 22-month low.
Significantly, the index is now down 18.4% from the same event in 2021 – the fastest pace of year-on-year decline since March 2016.
That actually heralded an improvement in GDT prices, which ran for the rest of 2016.
As to whether the current dip foreshadows better things to come, well, that will likely depend largely on Chinese demand, and on the persistence of the current uptick in northern hemisphere milk output.
Key moves in the November 1 GlobalDairyTrade auction included:
- An 8.6% slump to $2,972 per tonne in the skim milk powder (SMP) price, which is now below $3,000 per tonne for the first time since 2020.
- With whole milk powder (WMP) down a more modest 4.2%, to $3.279 per tonne, the premium of WMP over SMP soared by $136 per tonne to $307 per tonne, the most in nigh on a year.
- Anhydrous milk fat eased by 1.7% to $5,562 per tonne, in contrast to a 0.2% gain to $4,868 per tonne in the price of butter. That reduced the premium of anhydrous milk fat to butter by $116 per tonne to $694 per tonne, nearly exactly in line with the five-year average.
