It was a mixed picture for European dairy quotations overall last week, despite some movement within the individual products, according to multi-national financial services firm, StoneX.

The butter index saw its first gain in 10 weeks as it moved up by €115 (1.6%) to €7,290, Dr. Peter Meehan, StoneX senior EU dairy analyst, said.

Skim milk powder (SMP) recorded its ninth decline in a row dropping by €72 (2%) to €3,598, while whey increased by €4 (0.4%) to €917.

The whole milk powder (WMP) index recorded its first increase in eight weeks last week, rising by €80 (1.7%) to €4,907.

On the EEX Weekly European Cheese Indices, mild cheddar posted a slight decline while cheddar curd, gouda and mozzarella all moved higher.

“The total volume traded on EEX last week came to 189t (945 lots) with 325t trading over butter and 620t trading over SMP,” Meehan said.

Butter futures were back 0.1% to an average price of €6,984, while skim milk powder (SMP) was up 3.1% on the week at €3,534.

“Whey also saw a slight gain, moving up 0.4% on average over its August 2022 to March 2023 strip, with an average price of €986,” Meehan noted.

Dairy export data

Meanwhile, provisional data shows that European dairy exports in June were 9.6% behind the same month last year on a milk equivalent basis.

This was weaker than the 7.8% drop which had been forecasted for the month by StoneX.

“Infant milk formula and casein were the only two products to post a year-on-year increase in June with all other products posting sizeable year-on-year declines,” Meehan commented.

“Butter exports dropped back behind last year in June recording their lowest June since 2019 while SMP exports remained under pressure in June posting a four-year low for the month.

“Cheese exports were also down on last year in June, though this is against record numbers a year earlier, while WMP exports saw their lowest June since pre-2012,” he added.

Elsewhere, the value of New Zealand dairy exports was up by almost 40% to NZ$2 billion in July, driven by an increase in the value of fats and an improvement in exports to China.

Meehan also noted that the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) has increased its forecast for 2022 domestic milk production to 102.9 million tonnes, which would see production move 0.2% behind the volume collected in 2021.

The forecast for 2023 also increased slightly to 104.0 million tonnes.

USDA cited an increase in cow numbers, combined with higher-than-expected output/cow as the reasons for the revision.