By Kirk Maltais

The Department of Agriculture reported Friday that U.S. cattle inventories through Sept. 1 were on par with the same month last year.

Total supplies of cattle on feedlots were 11.3 million head, 45,000 higher from a year ago, the USDA said in its monthly Cattle on Feed Report. The uptick was roughly in line with analyst predictions, with those surveyed by The Wall Street Journal forecasting inventories to be virtually unchanged for the month.

Placements of cattle slowed also were flat, totaling 2.11 million head logged through August. Analysts were forecasting this figure to slide by 1.9 percentage points.

Marketings turned higher, totaling 2 million head, up 6% from the same time last year. This change was in line with analyst expectations of a 5.9% increase.

Livestock futures trading on the CME closed lower on Friday. The most-active cattle contract fell 0.5% to $1.49 a pound, while the most-active lean hogs contract fell 3.3% to 83.625 cents a pound.

Write to Kirk Maltais at kirk.maltais@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

September 23, 2022 15:38 ET (19:38 GMT)