By Kelsey Gee 
 

CHICAGO--Cash hog bids are steady to slightly lower across major production regions Tuesday, though prices so far this week have traded in a sideways pattern.

Bids range from steady with the prior sales to $1.00 lower, and top prices at the terminal markets on Monday ranged from $51 to $58 per hundred pounds on a live basis, and from $65 to $72 per hundredweight on a carcass basis--a form of pricing that accounts for the meat yielded from the animal. This price range has varied little in the past week.

Pork production continues to surpass year-ago levels, and Chicago Mercantile Exchange lean-hog futures used as a benchmark for some cash dealers have fallen to the lowest levels in months. Pork processors are working to maintain margins as wholesale prices drift in a sideways fashion, giving plants little incentive to bid up for a growing supply of hogs.

Projections for this Saturday's load of hogs to be processed total 55,000 to 60,000 head, down around 50,000 head from last weekend's estimated production.

The last available Wall Street Journal packer margin index for Monday was positive $24.19 per head, compared with positive $21.33 a head Friday.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture reported Monday the wholesale pork price, known in the industry as the cutout, rose $1.31 to $85.31 per hundred pounds, based on Omaha, Neb., price quotes.

Write to Kelsey Gee at kelsey.gee@wsj.com

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(END) Dow Jones Newswires

September 01, 2015 10:47 ET (14:47 GMT)