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.
2024-S24
The AWEX EMI closed on 1140c, down 2c at auction sales in Australia this week. All eyes were on the direction in the EMI in the penultimate sale for the year, and predictably the overall result remained uneventful with 91.1% of the 38,172 bales offered transferred to the trade.
The largest movements were unfortunately a further degradation in the Superfine and Ultrafine lots with solid support in the fine medium and medium merino’s, crossbreds and Carding types. Initially the competition initially came from the Australian trading Export Houses with the EMI falling 2c on Tuesday. Wednesday's ale saw the large Chinese Early-stage processors stepped up in their purchasing and challenged the traders and Chinese Indents. There is no doubt exporters are extremely cautious in their purchasing strategies which reflects the continued sluggish demand signals emanating from retail in our major markets.
Merino Fleece
opened with some reasonable buyer support for the early offering on Tuesday, unfortunately the market was unable to hold the early established levels and the 18.5 MPG’s and finer fell between 5 & 30c. Wednesday opened quickly establishing price support at the Tuesday’s price levels. Possibly driven by the AUD V USD exchange rate which continued to gyrate in a downward trend falling below the .64 USC mark over the course of the sale series. Once again, the 19 MPG and coarser held firm in all center's however Fremantle and Melbourne presented signs of increased competition on the 17-19MPG’s.
Merino Skirtings
opened the week with some irregularity on Skirtings with less than 6%VM. Premiums for the best prepared and specified Brokens were harder to identify whilst Wednesday market saw the purchasers become more selective and as light retracement of price support emerged as the day progressed.
Merino Cardings
and oddments were once again, well supported around last week’s levels with Sydney MC rising by 3c and Melbourne’s MC falling by 1c. Fremantle posted a 15c increase for the week.
Crossbred Fleece
Crossbred Oddments
Crossbreds
coarser than 27 microns continued to track sideways or slightly upwards on average whilst the 27 Micron and coarser XB fleece sold slightly better in the northern region whilst the Southern market were a combination of 3-5ceither side of last week’s levels. Competition from the Large Australian Traders and Chinese export traders.
Next Week
Graphs
Market Commentary
Market Commentary Wool prices have been remarkably stable for the past eighteen months with the EMI price range of 125ac/clean kg. The high of 1212c registered 12 months ago in December 2023 and a low of 1087ac was in August this year. The 18-month Eastern Market Indicator (EMI) average is currently 1144ac and the Western Market Indicator (WMI) at 1280ac/clean kg.
Whilst demand in textile items remain depressed at retail worldwide the 19% reduction on the auction offerings in 2024, has balanced out further negativity in price levels. No-one in the wool pipeline is crowing about their financial or operational performances however there is a general acceptance that there will be a gradual improvement in the latter part of 2025 as economic fundamentals around the world claw back inflation and begin to post more positive GDP.
In general,2024 has been one of the toughest periods experienced in my 45 years in the trade. Auction sales YOY are down 152,283 bales, a drop off over19%. With the Australian Wool production forecast about to release their December forecast, we believe more cuts in Wool production will occur as the season progresses.
Next week35,912 bales have been scheduled to be offered on Tuesday and Wednesday in Sydney and Melbourne with Fremantle electing to offer on Tuesday only with only5,700 bales available. Next week’s sale will be the last sale before the 3-weekrecess over the Christmas and New Year period. ~ Marty Moses.