IT’S been less that a month since the Eastern Market Indicator took the wool industry by surprise and skyrocketed to a new record of 1689 cents a kilogram.
But it appear it had not finished this record breaking run, as on Thursday last week that record was broken with the EMI hitting 1699c/kg.
Australian Wool Exchange market information manager Lionel Plunkett described last week’s auction as the “penultimate sale of the year”.
“With the opportunity to fill orders diminishing quickly (before the Christmas sales recess) buyer interest became intensified,” Mr Plunkett said.
He said all types and descriptions across the entire Merino spectrum enjoyed a boost in price as buyers fought hard to secure market share.
At Sydney sales the Northern Market Indicator gained 26c/kg to hit 1782c/kg, while in Melbourne the Southern Market Indicator lifted 20c/kg to settle on 1646c/kg.
“Wools possessing favourable length and strength results continue to attract the greatest competition, however even lots with poorer numbers managed to achieve similar gains,” he said.
“Growers are continuing to show willingness to sell at these levels, the clearance rate was again high, in this case over 97 per cent of Merino fleece wool was sold to the trade.”
In a pleasing trend, the crossbred sector also managed to reverse its downward pricing with solid gains.
Mr Plunkett said there were general price increases of 20c/kg to 55c/kg provided welcome news to growers of these broader types.
“The better prepared lines attracted the greatest buyer interest and as a result enjoyed the largest increases,” he said.