Bullish Divergence in Live Cattle – Are We Approaching a Bottom?

Live Cattle in Limbo
After sustaining all-time-highs for the majority of calendar 2023, both live and feeder cattle futures fell out of bed following the bearish Cattle on Feed Report on October 20th. Since then, the selloff has progressively accelerated without substantiating a higher close on a weekly basis since early November. At some point, every rally and every sell-off must come to an end. So, is there evidence that we may be approaching the bottom?
Following the Money (Flow)
The ābearish surpriseā in the October Cattle of Feed Report came from the Feed placement figures coming in higher than expected. The reportās release came on a Friday afternoon following the marketās close, so tradersā holding long positions had all weekend to stew on the effect that the report would have that coming Monday. Unsurprisingly, when live cattle gapped lower Monday, October 23rd, it sent cattle bulls running for the hills. The chart provided by the CME Group below shows the net-positioning of managed money funds in Live Cattle dating back to mid-September. As you can see, long interest in live cattle has been halved since then. One of the reasons that the market continues to seemingly melt away can be attributed to the fact that bulls are fearful of coming back to the market until the sell off slows.
Canary In the Coal Mine
One of the first warning signs that we were approaching a market top was the bearish divergence observed in the December ā23 Live Cattle contract. Well, we are now starting to see bullish divergence on the February contract. Could this finally be the sign that the bottom is in sight? If weāre going to use the bearish divergence on the December contract as a frame of reference, it took nearly 3 weeks in order for the market to eventually turn over. Looking at the chart above, we can see that the first instance of bullish divergence appeared on November 13th. If the timing were to play out similarly, it could indicate that the bottom is indeed in sight.