Waiting, Wishing and Wondering

The market started off relatively slow this week. Apart from some spread trades, we don't see traders making too many big decisions and end users and producers remain absent in the market. It seems the market is going through an unusually quiet period in November which normally is one of the most active trading periods of the year. Our partners wonder what the reason is behind the quiet market. Are producers waiting for higher prices? Or are end users just wishing that the prices go down? But while a lot of of partners are wondering, waiting and wishing for insights, the days of the years go by and we are getting closer to the Christmas period and the start of the new year.

Our eyes and ears have been trying to find some information on the market for liquids. The first indications seem to be that France, Germany and the Netherlands are seeing a bit more volumes compared to the week before. The milk dip is behind us, so liquid traders can prepare for a bit more volume. Especially in France, we hear raw milk, SMC and cream are a bit better to be found, which is unusual seeing their YoY milk production decline. It tells us something about the internal demand on the French market.

Looking at the exports we see that Algeria is back in the market with their ONIL tender. The most noticeable thing about their tender is the short-term needs they seem to have. That might tell us something about their stocks. The ONIL tender always pushes up prices a bit, but once the tender closes they usually drop back again.