This week: At the beginning of last week, some market participants tried to throw all their tricks and arguments into the balance to give prices a spin and upward momentum. Low kill levels were the central argument to justify higher prices. From our point of view, this met with very limited success, especially with articles that are exposed to currency influences.

Nevertheless, buyers and sellers in Europe had to agree on new prices and quantities for the month of February. This was mostly an exhausting task and hard work. In the end, we would summarise the result by saying that there was little change in the December and January prices for this month.

This is in keeping with the current market situation and, to be honest, one could have decided all of this much more quickly and easily. As early as January, there was a lot to be said for changing hide prices as little as possible in the interest of the general situation, at least until a clearer picture regarding further development on the markets becomes clear.

This industry is not known for wise and longer-term considerations. In any case, this means that until the big gathering for Lineapelle in Milan from February 21-23, there is little reason to worry about prices at the moment. Until then, interest and attention will be focused on the Asian market, with China the main centre of attention, of course.

When and to what extent production and consumption in the giant Chinese market will increase again and to what extent stocks and supply chains will have to be replenished remains unclear. Apart from the question of the general recovery in China, the focus is also on the extent to which products made of leather can benefit from this. From what one can hear in China at the moment, the most positive signals are coming from the automotive sector. A rather slow restart is expected for shoes and for furniture.

We’ll leave luxury goods manufactured in Europe aside, because they do not affect our business or the current problems, nor is there any doubt about the positive situation in this sector.
Another relatively unspectacular week without any major changes in prices is probably the best one can hope for at the moment.

The kill: There is no fundamental change in the kill either. Beef is relatively expensive and sales obviously do not allow for full production at the slaughterhouses. There are slaughterhouses that are only operating four days a week and others working at less than full capacity. At the moment we are unsure what could happen to change this in the coming weeks.

What we expect: We continue to find no real convincing argument that could move the market in the next few weeks. A certain uneasiness will result from political tensions that can be seen every week somewhere in the world. In Europe it has already led to war; let us hope that all parties involved will realise that war has never been a solution. With that, we are now intensively watching developments in China, where the holidays have finally come to an end now and we are getting closer to a full return to work of all players there.

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