Analysis milk
Less supply pressure and less price pressure on dairy products
It is difficult to demonstrate whether there is a very direct connection, but it appears that as supply pressure decreases, dairy prices also fall somewhat more slowly.
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In any case, there are no more major downward slides to be seen, as was the case last week with skimmed milk concentrate and cream. The market has largely calmed down again.
Remarkably, the quotations for skimmed milk powder and whey powder even show some recovery.
It is difficult to pinpoint a cause for this. There may be a slight effect of changing exchange rates and a new export tender for Algeria at play. Most parties in the powder market do not really see major changes.
An exception is lactose. The price of this has been rising for weeks in a row. This is due to extra demand from Asia, where buyers are moving to Europe due to the increased import duties for American products.
Secret path
In order to still get cheap American product to China, parties have come up with a back door, which partly runs through the Netherlands. In this, American ingredients are mixed in Europe to a product according to the specifications of, for example, the Chinese end customer. All parties involved can profit a little from this activity, but it is expected that the road in question will be closed soon.
The market for milk fat is also under pressure this week, but the butter price in particular continues to offer a lot of resistance to the downward pressure. After the price decreases of the last few weeks, it is much more attractive to make butter than cream. The cream price is now well below the butter parity, which makes it more attractive to make butter again. However, there is not much to be seen yet that the amount of butter coming onto the market is increasing. However, there is not much to be seen of this yet. The butter price has been hovering around or just above the level of €7,00 per kilo for several weeks now.
A division is visible on the cheese market. The prices for Gouda and Edam cheese and for mozzarella are still slightly under pressure, but the cheddar price is stabilizing. In combination with whey, cheese still offers the best value for milk. Mozzarella takes the lead in this respect, due to its low dry matter content. However, it is true that liquid whey concentrate no longer yields as much. If it is processed and refined to WPC80 or higher, then it is still a completely different story.