German Perspective - 03.09.19 - leatherbiz: Lea Leatherbiz

Intelligence

German Perspective - 03.09.19

03/09/2019
What happened this week: Who said that the hide and skin business would ever be fun? We just passed another week without any clear direction or activity. In history, in normal years, nobody would have bothered because it is the end of the holiday season and everyone was excited about the trip to Asia and to visit the All China Leather Exhibition in Shanghai, with the usual great expectations and hopes, the curiosity and excitement about meeting clients, international colleagues and competitors in the full hope of obtaining market insight to manage the business for the rest of the year. If, in addition, you could sell hides and skins, it was with great pleasure also accepted. This year is a bit different. Many people still travel to the event, although we know also many who do not even bother to pay for the trip now. There were also years in the past where people went with low expectations, but there was always that little edge at the back of their minds believing that something would happen that would trigger business and positive excitement. This year it seems the majority of people we speak to consider the trip to be a burden and a duty rather than anything positive or informative. There is little that could make anyone hope for a positive trend. 

Business for raw material can only get better with a rise in leather demand. We all may hope, but we are missing the facts. Leather as a material requires manufacturers to accept it again and manufacturers require more consumer interest and acceptance to make working with this complicated material worthwhile. Nothing is impossible, but we are all missing the trigger from somewhere that would make consumers ask specifically for leather as a material being used in the products they want to buy. As long as this fails to happen there will be nothing that can push the manufacturer to change materials.

The general global chaos in politics doesn’t make things any easier and everyone is trying to delay decisions as much as possible. We certainly don’t know yet what is going to be decided by the designers and manufacturers for the coming seasons but if we want to be positive, there are more leather products in the lifestyle magazines again. In particular, in garment, high street fashion shows jackets and pants made from leather again. We’ve seen this before and it never shifted into mass production, but it proves at least that designers have not turned on leather as a material completely. Natural and nice niche products still show very positive performance and the rising beef consumption in many parts of the world reflects that a sufficient number of people would be willing to buy leather products if they have a good reason to do so. The good news is that none of the specific qualities and the natural beauty of leather has disappeared either.

Business this week was pretty light. Tanners who are still producing need to buy raw material and the best performers for us continue to be in Europe. The activity from Asia this week was almost nil, which is not really a surprise considering that in particular the Chinese are waiting for the fair in Shanghai to learn how desperate sellers are and try again to get the best bargains possible. Prices in Europe were pretty much stable for the standard and core items.

The kill: The kill continues to climb in small steps. Pretty hot temperatures this week were actually not too good for beef sales, but the numbers are not at all unusual on either side. Weights continue to be reasonably heavy and in particular for males one has the impression that beasts have been held back and slaughtered late.

What we expect: Low expectations for this next week. We would be surprised if prices change much. This week will be mostly used to learn what we might have to expect from leather and raw material demand during this winter season. There is enough raw material around and until the stocks are cleared, price variations will most likely be pretty limited.

Type Weight range Avg. green weight Salted weight Avg. weight salted Price per kg green weight Trend
Ox/heifers 15/24,5 kg 22,0/23,5 kg 13/22 kg 20/21 kg € 1,20
 Stable
25/29,5 kg 27,5/28,5 kg 22/27 kg 25/26 kg € 0,65 Stable

Dairy cows

15/24,5 kg

22,5/23,5 kg

13/22 kg

20/21 kg

€ 0,65

 Stable

25/29,5 kg

27,5/28,5 kg

22/27 kg

25/26 kg

€ 0,50

 Stable

30/+kg

33,5/35,5 kg

27/+kg

29/31 kg

€ 0,45

 Stable
Bulls 25/29,5 kg 27,5/28,5 kg 22/ 27 kg 25/26 kg € 1,20
 Pressure
30/39,5 kg 36,0/37,0 kg 24/34 kg 31/33 kg € 1.20
 Pressure
40/+ kg 45,0/48,0 kg 34/+kg 38/40 kg € 1.05
 Pressure
Thirds 15/+kg 25,0/27,5 kg 13/+kg 24/26 kg € 0,30
 Weak
Thirds bulls 30/+kg 38,0/40,0 kg 24/+kg 33/36 kg € 0,45
 Weak



Leatherbiz.com cannot be held responsible for content if the language setting is changed from English.

The translations provided by Google Translate are automated and therefore might not be accurate and may contain incorrect, offensive or misleading language. We offer this facility as a guide only.