It was another hugely positive week on the dairy markets, with substantial price increases for all key commodities, fuelling hope that Irish milk prices will see further lifts in the coming months. Once again butter is the star performer, increasing in price by €145/t to reach €7,880/t. This is just €240/t off the most recent peak price achieved in late September of €8,120/t.
It was another hugely positive week on the dairy markets, with substantial price increases for all key commodities, fuelling hope that Irish milk prices will see further lifts in the coming months.
Once again butter is the star performer, increasing in price by €145/t to reach €7,880/t. This is just €240/t off the most recent peak price achieved in late September of €8,120/t.
The futures market for butter is also strengthening, with over €7,000/t now expected for all of quarter one 2025.
Other commodities also picked up, with whole milk powder (WMP) increasing by €90/t and skim milk powder (SMP) increasing by €80/t.
That’s an increase of 2.1% for WMP and 3.3% for SMP, so they are substantial price rises and show that the market is going in the right direction.
However, it was a flat week for cheese, with no change in price at €5,000/t for cheddar. It seems that there is plenty of cheese on the market while butter is in shorter supply.
These prices follow on from the very positive Global Dairy Trade auction last week, which saw the index increase by 4.8%.
Again this week, there was good gains for SMP at the pulse auction, with prices increasing by €52/t while WMP increased by €177/t.
Fonterra also announced this week that it is increasing its projected milk price for the rest of this season. This is in spite of the fact that milk solids deliveries in New Zealand are up a staggering 8% for the first three months of the season. It will be interesting to see if this trend continues as the country moves into peak milk period.
This is a subscriber-only article
SHARING OPTIONS: