CattleCon 2025 provides US beef industry outlook

During the recent CattleCon 2025, the CattleFax Outlook Seminar was held, where experts detailed market and weather analysis for the upcoming year.

Early markers indicate the US beef industry appears ready for a strong market performance driven by tight cattle supplies and continued consumer demand.

The seminar noted the beef cowherd will enter a stabilization phase following years of contraction, the resulting supply constraints shifting market leverage decisively in favor of cattle producers.

Another noteworthy area covered in the seminar was the impact of weather conditions on grazing availability, herd expansion and cattle prices during 2025.

Meteorologist Matt Makens noted a La Niña this winter brings somewhat volatile weather changes across North America with the majority of weather extremes affecting those in the Central to Eastern United States. For Mexico and the Southwestern United States, producers will see drought acreage increase as it has nationwide since June.

“Drought will likely increase across the Western US this spring and into the Pacific Northwest, Northern Plains, and Canadian Prairies through this summer,” Makens said. “To watch will be the North American monsoon and how much drought relief it can provide to Mexico, the Southwest, and parts of the Plains. Current data show the monsoon will likely produce more moisture this year than last. A strong enough monsoon can decrease precipitation across the central Corn Belt, watch July closely. Late in the year, the focus turns to the development of La Niña or El Niño.”

Another area touched on was the economic outlook, energy, and feed grains by Troy Bockelmann, director of protein and grain analysis at CattleFax. He explained inflation eased in 2024 by ending the year at 2.9%, which was a drop from 9% in 2022. However, it was still above the Federal Reserve’s 2% target. During the second part of 2024 the Fed decided to cut interest rates three times, which brought the Prime bank loan rate to 7.5%

Labor numbers showed that unemployment rose briefly midyear and then fell to 4.1% as job creation outpaced expectations. Projections from Bockelmann and economists expect the US economy to see GDP growth of 2 to 2.5% in 2025.