At the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, Class III milk futures closed mixed Wednesday on technical selling. March milk closed down $0.03 at $14.02. April was down $0.02 at $14.11. May closed $0.04 lower to $14.77. June milk was down $0.01 at $14.77. The rest of the 2018 milk futures closed down two cents to two cents a hundredweight higher. For February, the USDA says the Class II milk price was $13.44 per hundredweight, down $0.67 from January, the Class III price was $13.40, $0.60 lower, and Class IV was $12.87, down $0.26.
Grade AA Butter was $0.0050 lower at $2.1775. Thirteen loads were sold ranging from $2.1775 to $2.1825. Barrels were unchanged at $1.47. 40 # blocks were unchanged at $1.53. Nonfat dry milk was unchanged at $0.6725. The USDA reports cash butter for the week ending February 24th averaged $2.11 per pound, $0.038 higher than the previous week. 40 pound blocks of cheddar were pegged at $1.53, $0.004 higher. 500 pound barrels averaged $1.41, an increase of $0.021. Dry whey came out at $0.255, up $.005. Nonfat dry milk averaged $0.711, unchanged from the week before.
