Soybean meal price

Soybean meal is a protein feed, fed to raise a ration's crude-protein content. On a dry-matter basis it runs about 53.5% crude protein and 82% TDN, roughly 0.94 Mcal of net energy for lactation per pound of dry matter, at about 89% dry matter as fed. Those figures come from feedtables.com (INRA/CIRAD/AFZ), soybean meal 48%, citing NRC 2001. SBM-48. TDN clusters 81-82% (NRC-2001/dairy method) vs 87-88% (older NRC-Beef-1996 tables); 82 is the dairy-relevant midpoint. The leaderboard uses them to convert each USDA report week's board price into a cost per pound of protein and per pound of energy, so it can be ranked against corn and soybean meal. Prices are quoted per ton, and the cheapest board price is not the cheapest fed price once freight and moisture are counted (see the FOB-vs-delivered guide). Soybean meal is the protein benchmark this whole board is measured against, crushed from soybeans at plants concentrated across the Corn Belt and the Mississippi Delta. Crush economics increasingly run on the oil side of the ledger: renewable diesel and biodiesel demand for soybean oil has pulled new crush capacity online, with meal arriving as the co-product of a decision made mostly for the oil. Export demand, historically led by China, competes with the US animal feed industry for the same beans, the largest buyer spanning poultry, swine and dairy rations. Its amino acid balance, lysine especially, beats almost every other plant meal here, the real reason it sets the standard others are priced against.

The crusher is paid for two products, not one. K-State Research and Extension defines the crush margin as the value of the meal and oil from a bushel less the price of the raw soybeans, with a 60-pound bushel yielding about 44 pounds of meal and 11 pounds of oil. By weight the bushel is mostly meal, but either side can carry the margin. When oil carries it, plants keep crushing and meal output rises whether feeders need more or not, so the meal price does the adjusting. USDA's Economic Research Service ties larger crush volumes directly to downward pressure on meal prices, and notes meal demand is what traditionally drove crush volume.

Every other protein on this board is priced against it. Feed buyers value an alternative protein by what it replaces: soybean meal for protein and corn for energy, the two-anchor method laid out in the corn and soybean meal benchmark. NDSU Extension prices distillers grains for dairy rations exactly that way, using soybean meal and corn as the standards for protein and energy. ERS weighs soybean meal's own competitiveness against mid-protein feeds such as distillers grains and other oilseed meals, and against feed grains such as corn and feed wheat.

Poultry is the buyer that sets the pace. The American Soybean Association's Soy Stats, drawing on soybean checkoff demand assessments, ranks poultry as by far the largest U.S. user of soybean meal. Dairy and swine follow well behind, roughly level with each other, while beef, pet food and aquaculture take small shares. Grade follows the buyer. K-State notes meal made for poultry and swine has most of its hulls removed, because monogastric animals cannot use the fiber, while dairies take some high-protein meal because it can vary less than the 44 percent product.

Abroad, the United States is not the price leader. ERS notes Brazil and Argentina have each surpassed the United States in soybean meal exports. Argentina is the largest meal exporter, and ERS notes U.S. meal competes with Argentine supplies on price, tariffs and freight, while the European Union, the biggest importer, sources most of its meal from Argentina and Brazil. When drought cut Argentina's supplies, ERS found buyers in Vietnam and the EU turned to U.S. meal. A short South American crop opens export doors; a big one closes them, and the domestic price has to absorb whatever meal is left to clear.