Western Wool Indicator falls this week

30 Mar '07

4 min read

The Australian wool market finished 1.3% lower, on average, at sales in Sydney, Melbourne and Fremantle this week. The AWEX EMI fell by 10¢ (-1.1%), ending the week at 933¢/kg clean. This reflected decreases of 11¢ ( 1.1%) in the North and 11¢ (-1.2%) in the South, with their corresponding Regional Indicators finishing the week at 966¢ and 904¢ clean respectively. The Western Indicator decreased by 15¢ (-1.6%), finishing the week at 936¢/kg clean.

When compared with the start of the upward movement of the market in October, the EMI and the Northern, Southern, and Western Indicators are up by 192¢ (25.9%), 200 (26.1%), 184¢ (25.6%) and 219¢ (30.5%), respectively. 19 to 23 average AWEX Micron Price Guides are up by 213¢ to 239¢ over the period and by 170¢ for 24 micron wools. At the fine end, the changes are 104¢ for 17 micron wool, 148¢ for 17.5, 163¢ for 18 and 175¢ for 18.5 micron wool.

62,185 bales were on offer, compared with 63,558 last week (and 6,000 more than forecast at the beginning of last week). 15.0% were passed in, comprised of 12.0% in Sydney, 12.3% in Melbourne and 21.3% in Fremantle. Pass in rates for Merino fleece and skirtings were 18.3% and 9.2% respectively. 2,855 bales (4.4%) were withdrawn prior to sale and re-offered wools made up 11.0% of this week's offering.

The lift in prices three weeks ago has flushed a lot more wool onto the market than originally expected over the last two weeks and again next week. The New Zealand Merino Company offered 2,388 bales for sale on Tuesday, including 50.5% of re-offered wools. 23.9% were passed in.

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