Market Intelligence
Weekly Wool Market Commentary
Moses & Son is committed to providing our valued customers the most current information and data to empower your decision-making process. Discover our latest Australian wool market weekly update below, along with archived reports for your perusal and analysis.
2026-S17
The AWEX EMI closed on 1785c down 18c at auction sales in Australia this week. The national offering fell back to 25,892 bales (down 7373 bales from last week), with all selling centres operating. 86.4% of the offering cleared to the trade, as sellers reserved their right to refuse the bid. The EMI ease over both sale days reflecting the lack of enthusiasm of the exporters to sell forward under the market levels to gain business. However, the Chinese exporters buying for Top-making indents continue to buy with reduced competition to keep wool in front of their machinery, in the hope of emerging improvements retail driven market signals from down the wool pipeline.
Merino Fleece
Merino Fleece: Buyer interest focused on the Super-fine and Fine better-style, low-VM, well-measured wools with favourable L & S (especially lower CVH). This segment was the least affected by price pressure and interestingly the 17 MPGs opened the season on 2617c and closed this week on 2593c down less than 1% (24c) in 17 weeks. Competition for lower-style and higher-VM lots was more selective, driving the higher passed-in rates. An increasing number of lots are emerging that are over 110mm in staple length, which is experiencing reduced competition week on week, resulting in slightly higher discounts, arguably a reasonable trade-off for the extra fleece weights. 60% of the fleece lots purchased went to the top buyers, with the large Australian owned Trading exporters and Chinese processors dominating the Fleece.
Merino Skirtings
Merino Skirtings followed the fleece and like the superfine best specs Fleece the best prepared low VM skirtings are still attracting good competition, albeit slightly cheaper week on week, these lots still get rewarded with premiums to the average prepared and specified lots. 70% of the skirtings purchased went to the top buyers, with similar distribution between the large Australian owned Trading exporters and Chinese processors dominating the Fleece.
Merino Cardings
Merino Cardings experienced a range of slightly weaker prices across the selling centres. The Northern Selling Centre reflecting a -5c fall, whilst Southern Selling Centre saw prices drop 12c and finally 23c falls in Fremantle. 50.4% of the offering was distributed relatively evenly distributed across the top 4 buyers.
Crossbred Fleece
Crossbred Oddments
Crossbreds
Crossbreds are increasing in volume week on week as we sail through spring shearings towards the summer months. The extra volume has taken the pressure off supply shortages, and the price reflects that sentiment. 62.6% went to the top 4 buyers.
Next Week
Next weeks estimate for the National offering creeps up to 31,398 bales. The early market intelligence is more of the same apprehension from the exporters to buy what they have not sold. ~ Marty Moses.
Market Commentary
Market Commentary: Let’s start with the fundamentals: - Year-on-year: EMI is up ~25% (1,427 c same week last year); offerings are down ~12.5%. The rise in passed-in rates signals that the market supports the consistent reports out of China of price resistance for Wool Tops across the wool pipeline, rather than experiencing a collapse in underlying demand. Up until now Buyers remain active but very selective purchasing for immediate delivery and avoiding building inventory. Predictably, some sellers are unwilling to meet the lower bids on secondary types. This is consistent with a market adjusting after a strong rally earlier in the season, within an environment of structurally tight supply. October has some history in "pregnant price pauses”, being a month that usually is waiting for clearer price signals from the wool processing and retail pipeline.
Over the past few months, we have conversations with clients about selling or holding. So far, the "sellers" are in front!