Chart of the Day - December Live Cattle

The information and opinions expressed below are based on my analysis of price behavior and chart activity

Thursday, October 16, 2025

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Every morning, at about 8 AM CST, I post a short video highlighting where I see opportunities in the futures markets.  You can view my most recent video here   

 December Live Cattle (Daily) 

Today, December Live Cattle set and closed at new contract highs, marking 10 consecutive sessions of price gains.  The market gained 1.100 to settle at 247.875, not far from the high of the day which was 248.300.  Tomorrow is Friday, and the 10-day rally might be at risk for a bit of profit taking.  Having said that, there’s nothing that I see on this chart that is bearish.  The cash market remains strong, with 240 sales being reported in IA and NE today, according to the USDA’s daily slaughter report. 

The 5- and 10-day moving averages are offering potential support levels, at 245.685 (blue) and 241.610 (red) respectively.  The 50-day (green, 236.512) has been great support, as it held in June and September.  The 100- and 200-day averages (grey/purple, 236.175/211.770) are both well below the market price and not currently in play.  All of those averages are inclined higher.  Daily Stochastics are in an overbought condition, but looking back over this chart view, this market has been happy to be overbought and trending higher for most of what we can see. 

Besides the moving average support levels mentioned above, I would also expect to find support near the previous contract high (Aug 27^th) or even to the Sept high of 241.350.  That would be below the 10-day average, but still a possible support area.

As far as upside targets, the nice, big, fat round number of 250.000 is only 2.125 away from today’s close.  We could easily see prices trade there tomorrow and get hit by a wave of profit taking, potentially turning prices lower.  After all, the market has been UP for 10 days straight!  Resistance levels or price targets above that, get a little difficult to predict, in my opinion.  Even 1.000 levels (251, 252, 253, etc.) or, perhaps, 5.000 levels (250, 255, 260) are all reasonable targets to my eye, given the way this market has been trading. 

Fundamentally, we still have less cattle and still have more people to feed.  Our Beef imports are at record high levels.  That indicates to me that 1, we don’t have the herd size to fill our current demand and consumption needs and 2, consumer demand remains very strong. We may be complaining about how high grocery store prices are, but we keep buying.  Until either of those conditions change, I’d be surprised to see the Cattle markets turn bearish.  Normally, next week’s scheduled Cattle on Feed Report would give us a quarterly insight into heifer retentions, which could be an early sign of herd rebuild. However, the gov’t shutdown doesn’t seem like it will end by next Friday, and I don’t think we’ll get it. 

Aggressive and well-margined traders may do well to consider long futures positions in Live Cattle.  AS I have no clear entry signal and I don’t know your account size and risk-tolerance, I’ll leave the entry and your protective stop up to you.   Daily pivot points can be an effective entry/exit tool, call me if you need details on those, as that’s a whole different article.  I think any of the nearby support levels that I mentioned above would work, if you’re looking for a place to start from.

Less aggressive traders may do well to consider Call options.  A December 255 Call settled at 2.200 today, or $880 before your commissions/fees.  If something less expensive appeals to you more, the Dec 260 Calls closed at 1.125, or $450 out-of-pocket before commissions/fees. I would suggest placing GTC orders at 2x what you paid for the options and then re-evaluating the trend.  If the trend is still strong, look to buy another strike price higher, but only spend what you spent initially.  In other words, if you buy an option for 2.00, place a GTC order at 4.00.  If that order is filled, find the next strike price that you can buy for that same 2.00. I would not recommend paying up more or chasing the market.

Cattle producers should not be short the futures market, in my opinion, as the uptrend has been dominant and nobody really likes or needs margin calls.  If you are worried about downside risk, I’d suggest Put Options, instead.  December Put options have 50 days to expiration. If your fat cattle are going out sooner than that, the November options based off of the December futures have 22 days to expiration and are somewhat less expensive than the longer expiry. If you need suggestions or strategies, call or email me directly.

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Every morning, at about 8 AM CST, I post a short video highlighting where I see opportunities in the futures markets.  You can view my most recent video here   

 December Live Cattle (Weekly)

With Thursday’s close, the December Live Cattle futures have gained 5.350 on the week.  This market has been in a bullish trend, measured by the 5- and 10-week moving averages, since the first week in October of last year.  It’s obviously not been a straight line move, but the trend is very strong.  Those moving averages have come close to making a bearish crossover several time since then, but have not yet closed out a week in a bearish configuration.  In fact, early last week those averages were making a crossover, but by the time the week was over, that signal had vanished.  The Doji, or equilibrium bar from 3 weeks (bars) ago was key, to my eye.  Last week’s directional close, above that Doji’s range, indicates to me that the market is still strong and that the bulls are in charge.  The 5-week average (blue, 238.950) and the 10-week average (red, 237.640) are offering potential trend support levels, I think. The 50-week (green, 207.722) is not in play at the current time.  I would also look for potential support, should the market pull back, near the previous contract high of 243.575 which was set the last week in August.  Weekly Stochastics (bottom sub-graph) are in overbought status, but it seems this market has been overbought for almost all of the past year or so. 

If Seasonal Data is in your wheelhouse, you can visit Barchart’s Seasonal information here.   It seems to show that the December Live Cattle prices typically continue higher until this contract expires.  87% of the time in October, 73% of the time in November and 86% of the time over the past 15 years, according to their data.  The 12.100 that they show the December contract has gained, so far this month, would rank this month at the 3^rd largest gain over that time frame.  That’s also over 2x what the “average” month of October gains are shown as.

If you like what you’ve read here and would like to see more like this from Walsh Trading, please Click here and sign up for our daily futures market email. 

Every morning, at about 8 AM CST, I post a short video highlighting where I see opportunities in the futures markets.  You can view my most recent video here   

Jefferson Fosse  Walsh Trading

Direct 312 957 8248 Toll Free 800 556 9411

jfosse@walshtrading.com   www.walshtrading.com

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