Merino Fleece experienced good rises between 7c and 55c with noticeable premiums for best style superfine lots with best specifications.
Export activity was led by the large Australian traders who were pushed aggressively throughout the week by the Chinese indent buyers keen to keep continuity in their weekly purchase levels.
With the “just in time” purchasing strategy suffering under the current logistic challenges, the wool processing pipeline faces the challenge of a move to “just in case” inventory management which puts further pressure on credit capacity and finance availability.
The AWEX EMI closed on 1401c up 24c – at auction sales in Australia this week.
After the EMI hovered between 1369 and 1377c in April, the sharp rise to above 1400c EMI is both encouraging and surprising in the face of the logistical and financial challenges.
The positive movement in the EMI saw 94% of the 40,153 bale offering sold over the two day sales held in all centres. Currency Exchange was also favourable to our major export customers trading in USD, which has seen a 5.4% fall in the value in the AUD over the past 5 weeks which has also softened the impact of the challenges in finance and logistics.
Merino Fleece experienced good rises between 7c and 55c with noticeable premiums for best style superfine lots with best specifications. Just 27% of the fleece lots were Style 4 or better and 38% of the national offering was under 1.0% VM which is well below the YTD average of 49.8%.
This is reflective in the elevated competition on these types and more noticeable in the superfine and ultrafine categories. Whilst discounts for inferior specified wools were evident, the financial impact was less than the past month.
Merino Skirtings also experienced great competition from the get go. 16-18μ skirtings far exceeded price expectations whilst the 19-21 skirtings increasing moderately. This week’s skirting national pass in rates around 3.5%, well below the 11% YTD average. |
