Feasibility Assessment of Reporting Negotiated Slaughter Cattle 

Purchases in Separate Delivery Window Categories

Ted C. Schroeder

Lee L. Schulz

and

Glynn T. Tonsor1

November 4, 2019

Research Report Prepared for 

The United States Department of Agriculture 

Agricultural Marketing Service

 1 Schroeder is distinguished professor, Agricultural Economics, Kansas State University; Schulz is associate 

professor, Economics, Iowa State University; Tonsor is professor, Agricultural Economics, Kansas State University. 

We acknowledge funding support from the USDA, Agricultural Marketing Service for this project. All opinions 

expressed are those solely of the authors.
Table of Contents 

Executive Summary...................................................................................................................................... 1

Purpose and Undertaking ........................................................................................................................ 1

Challenges................................................................................................................................................. 1

Conclusions and Recommendations........................................................................................................ 2

Future LMR Considerations...................................................................................................................... 5

Introduction and Background...................................................................................................................... 6

Objectives..................................................................................................................................................... 9

Procedures.................................................................................................................................................... 9

Baseline Analysis...................................................................................................................................... 9

Alternative Alignments.......................................................................................................................... 10

Results ........................................................................................................................................................ 12

Data Filters Applied................................................................................................................................ 12

Alternative Market Region Alignments..................................................................................................... 18

Confidentiality for Alternative Market Alignments.................................................................................. 24

Statistical Price Modeling........................................................................................................................... 38

Hedonic Modeling ...................................................................................................................................... 47

Recommended Market Alignment ............................................................................................................ 56

Rationale for Recommended Regions................................................................................................... 57

Appendix..................................................................................................................................................... 61
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Executive Summary 

 

Purpose and Undertaking 

This study was undertaken to determine the feasibility of reporting slaughter steer and heifer 

purchases in separate 0-14 and 15-30 day delivery windows through possible realignment of 

reporting markets subject to confidentiality constraints. To accomplish this, we undertook a 

comprehensive statistical analysis of all 2014-18 negotiated transactions reported to the United

States Department of Agriculture Agricultural Marketing Service (USDA AMS) under Livestock 

Mandatory Reporting (LMR) statute. 

Challenges 

Several complex challenges and tradeoffs became apparent in assessing ways to potentially 

reduce LMR confidentiality constraints in fed cattle negotiated price reporting separately for 0-

14 and 15-30 day delivery windows:

• Insufficient 15-30 day Transactions. Nationally over the five-year period, 15-30 day 

trade represented only 15% of negotiated transactions. Combined with declining 

negotiated trade in fed cattle markets nationally over time, 15-30 day transactions 

represent a small share of what has become a relatively thinly traded negotiated 

market. The result is that 15-30 day trade is often not reportable in most regional 

markets. 

• Regionality where 15-30 day transactions occur. The frequency of 15-30 day negotiated 

transactions has been relatively concentrated in two market reporting regions, NE and 

IA/MN, which represented nearly two-thirds of fed cattle purchased nationally in the 

15-30 day window. In contrast, TX/OK/NM, CO, and KS, 15-30 day purchases were rare.

• Confidentiality precludes reporting. Because of the rarity of 15-30 day purchases, small 

numbers of negotiated trade in general, and a concentrated beef packing industry, 

especially in certain market regions, confidentiality guidelines often precluded reporting

15-30 day market information. 

• Can aggregation resolve the issue? The most apparent way to attempt to address 

confidentiality constraints is to increasingly aggregate transactions across reporting 

categories, locations, or over time. For example, one can consider aggregating across 

characteristics of transactions within a region such as combining steers and heifers into 

a single category, combining live and dressed, combining FOB and delivered, and so 

forth. Another consideration is to aggregate spatially across geographic markets. Finally, 

one can consider combining multiple days or weeks in reported categories. Combining 

transactions reduces the content of the market information that is discernable from 

market reports. Furthermore, if dissimilar transaction characteristics with divergent 

market values are combined this can result in reported market information that is 
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difficult to interpret or of little value. The tradeoff is clear, aggregation might increase 

reportability, but at the cost of information content and value.

Conclusions and Recommendations 

This study combined information across transaction characteristics and exhaustively considered 

alternative regional market alignments to assess viability of reporting relative to confidentiality 

guidelines and impacts of aggregating on reported market information. Combining several 

cattle types into a single aggregate price report (similar, but not identical, to what AMS does 

currently in the National Weekly Fed Cattle Comprehensive report) reduces chances that 

confidentiality will be compromised. Steers, heifers, mixed steers/heifers, dressed, live, 

delivered, FOB, types of transactions were all combined in an attempt to increase the chances

confidentiality constraints would not preclude reporting of 15-30 day delivery market 

information. From this aggregated data, we examined 10 alternative geographic market 

alignments to investigate how different alignments impact confidentiality constraints as well as 

information content of reported prices.

Our recommendations were framed with the goal of providing as much market information for 

as many alternative geographic market regions as feasible given fed cattle market structure and 

marketing method usages over the 2014-18 period. However, the value of reported market 

information depends upon the level of aggregation in the reported data. Aggregating 

transactions across geographic regions with markets that are not well integrated can reduce the 

value of information. For example, combining a thinly traded market with a more liquid market 

region can reduce the value of information otherwise contained in the liquid region alone. We 

considered these types of tradeoffs carefully in forming the following recommendations. 

• Reporting of 15-30 day separately from 0-14 day trade is feasible only on a national 

reporting basis and is not feasible for regional market reports. About half the time in the 

IA/MN market (and other corn-belt added market alignments considered with these 

states as well) the 15-30 day trades could be reported. In no other market region could 

these two windows of trade be separately reported more than 20% of the time, at best, 

regardless of how alternative states in the region were aligned. The challenge is due to a 

confounding combination of confidentiality guidelines and small numbers of 15-30 day 

transactions in specific regions. A separate 15-30 day price could be reported about half 

the time for a 5-Area report (depending on what states were included in the alignment), 

but this would essentially be the same as the national report since the vast majority of 

15-30 day trade occurs in states in the current 5-Area reporting regions.

• Realignment of fed cattle market reporting relative to the current alignment is 

recommended for reasons other than reporting 15-30 day trade separate from 0-14 day. 

Our recommended regional alignment for negotiated market information reporting is 

shown in the figure below.

o We recommend adding SD to a regional market report. SD had the 4th largest 

volume of negotiated trade of all states. IL is next in line in terms of volume for 

states not currently included in regional reports. We would combine SD and IL 
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with IA/MN to create an IA/MN/SD/IL regional market. These markets have 

similar price structures so combining these together would not adversely impact 

IA/MN price reporting quality and would add important regional market volume 

for negotiated trade. IN and OH could be included in this region, however, 

collectively they represent less than 1% of combined negotiated transactions, 

adding them does little to impact reportability, and including them increases 

variation in reported prices. 

o We recommend combining CO with WY for negotiated price reporting. These 

markets appear to have similar pricing patterns and combining these states 

would reduce confidentiality constraints for the CO market that are now present 

for even 0-30 and 0-14 day window transactions. WY has the 9th largest volume 

of negotiated trade and it appears to complement market information in CO and 

could potentially also improve the quality of market information otherwise 

reportable for just CO alone. However, our analysis also reveals that adding WY 

to CO will not alleviate challenges with reporting regular market information for 

the CO/WY region as there will likely be some weeks market information will not 

be reportable. Including WY helps marginally increase reporting viability subject 

to maintaining confidentiality in this region but does not resolve concerns. At 

some point, reporting even a combined CO/WY negotiated market report may 

no longer be viable.

o We recommend leaving NE and KS regional markets as they are now. NE and KS 

markets do not have an obvious additional state or states to combine with that 

would enhance the quality of information and they each have very high 

reportability for 0-14 and 0-30 day transactions. Neither of these markets are

reportable for 15-30 day transactions.

o We do not have a recommendation for the TX/OK/NM market to improve 

reportability or quality of market information. One could combine KS with 

TX/OK/NM to get a reportable regional market that includes these states 

together, but this would slightly reduce the quality of information and the 

average price contained in the KS report and would not add enough volume to 

the KS negotiated trade report to justify. The TX/OK/NM region has similar 

challenges to CO/WY with few negotiated trades occurring and a concentrated 

packing sector confounding confidentiality concerns as it relates to negotiated 

market information reporting. The pragmatic outcome may inevitably be to 

discontinue publishing a separate TX/OK/NM negotiated report.
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Future LMR Considerations 

• The way LMR data are currently reported by packers to AMS, the state of origin of 

cattle are the only origin identification for domestic purchases. Major cattle feeding 

states have feedlot and packer densities and structures that differ widely across 

individual states and certainly similar structures span across state lines. Consider for 

example Western KS, TX Panhandle, or Eastern CO where cattle densities differ more 

within the state than across state lines. Reporting cattle origin by zip code or another 

more granular level than states and evaluating market reporting from more refined 

origin locations that potentially divide states and combine across state lines is worth 

considering. We expect this could increase what we refer to as the quality or content of 

the market information reported. We also expect this would result in a different 

alignment for market reporting than what we recommend in this report.

• Although not part of this study’s objective, but worthy of future assessment, is how 

specific clauses of the 3/70/20 confidentiality guidelines and associated unique 

attributes of the slaughter cattle market impact price reporting capability. Clearly 

confidentiality is the key concern and whether confidentiality can be maintained with 

other specific guidelines is worth considering. Exploration of alternative confidentiality 

guidelines might be worthwhile. However, we see little prospect for even liberal 

confidentiality guidelines enabling reporting of 15-30 day market information 

separately for anything other than a national market report.

• Negotiated trade market information reporting conditional on maintaining 

confidentiality has become challenging as fed cattle procurement methods have 

evolved over time. Modifying reporting regions cannot resolve thinning market trends. 

Addressing this issue is well beyond the scope of this study, but our analysis conducted 

here sheds even greater light on the significance of this issue for viable systematic 

reporting of negotiated trade fed cattle market information. This issue will continue to 

occupy industry attention. 

• Because the fed cattle industry is undergoing considerable structural change in 

numerous aspects from the ways cattle are purchased by packers to location of cattle 

feeding, we recommend continued assessments of how to potentially group market 

information across states, regions, and by purchase types be done periodically. The 

pace of change in the fed cattle market is rapid and AMS needs to be able to assess and 

make adjustments to reporting as the market environment changes.

 
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Introduction and Background Livestock Mandatory Reporting (LMR) conducted by the Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) of 

the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) provides essential market information to industry 

participants enhancing decision making and market efficiency. The Livestock Mandatory 

Reporting Act of 1999 (1999 Act) established slaughter cattle market reporting requirements 

for beef packers slaughtering or processing 125,000 head or more annually. Protecting identity

of reporting entities and maintaining confidentiality of individual transactions is required by the 

1999 Act. AMS uses what is referred to as the 3/70/20 guideline2 to ensure confidentiality of 

reported market information under LMR. 

The 2008 LMR reauthorization modified terms of trade for negotiated transactions for steers 

and heifers. Prior to this time, negotiated transactions referred to cattle scheduled for delivery 

not later than 14 days after the purchase date. Cattle scheduled for delivery beyond 14 days 

were considered forward contracts. Beginning with the 2008 reauthorization, a revised

category for negotiated purchases of cattle scheduled for delivery more than 14 days but fewer 

than 30 days was added to negotiated transactions.3 As such, two negotiated purchase 

categories, 0-14 and 15-30 day delivery windows, for each dressed and live slaughter steers and 

heifers could conceivably be reported by AMS. However, confidentiality constraints have 

precluded AMS from separating these two delivery windows in negotiated purchase price 

reporting. Instead, negotiated purchases for regional fed cattle markets have been reported 

under a single 0-30 day delivery window. 

A concern with grouping negotiated transactions into a 0-30 day delivery window is when cattle 

prices are forward trending, combining transactions across the 30-day delivery window could 

result in averaging out and masking the market trend. This could result in reported negotiated 

prices being greater for nearby delivery trades compared to more distant deliveries during a 

downtrend and vice-versa during an uptrend in the market which would not be discernable in 

reported negotiated transactions that combine 0-14 and 15-30 day deliveries into a single 

weighted-average price quote. Industry participants have keen interest in assessment of 

whether negotiated transactions could be separated into 0-14 and 15-30 day delivery 

windows.

4 Currently, AMS reports separate 0-145 and 15-30 day delivery window weekly 

negotiated average prices combining live and dressed transactions on a national basis in the 

National Weekly Fed Cattle Comprehensive report.6 The challenge is the 3/70/20 confidentiality 

constraint often precludes separating these two delivery window reporting categories for

 2 The 3/70/20 guideline requires: 1) at least three reporting entities need to provide data at least 50 percent of the 

time over the most recent 60-day time period; 2) no single reporting entity may provide more than 70 percent of 

the data for a report over the most recent 60-day time period; and 3) no single reporting entity may be the sole 

reporting entity for an individual report more than 20 percent of the time over the most recent 60-day time 

period. https://www.ams.usda.gov/sites/default/files/media/ConfidentialityGuidelines.pdf 3 https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2008/05/16/E8-10185/livestock-mandatory-reportingreestablishment-and-revision-of-the-reporting-regulation-for-swine 4 https://nebraskacattlemen.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/live-cattle-final.pdf 5 AMS reports separate 0-14 day (which is labeled as “1-14” in the published market report). 6 https://www.ams.usda.gov/mnreports/lswfedcc.pdf
7 | Page

individual state (e.g., NE, CO, or KS) or multi-state (TX/OK/NM or IA/MN) negotiated purchase

reports or the current 5-Area regional market report.

The 5-Area market reporting region, currently comprised of fed cattle purchases from 

producers located in the 1) Minnesota, Iowa; 2) Nebraska; 3) Kansas; 4) Oklahoma, New 

Mexico, Texas; or 5) Colorado market regions, was established in 1989. Since that time, 

significant changes have occurred in regional fed cattle production. Moreover, since the 

changes made to negotiated purchase price reporting in 2008, substantial structural changes 

have occurred in slaughter cattle markets. Negotiated trade has declined from around 55% of 

cattle purchases down to 25% (Figure 1) with some regions such as TX/OK/NM declining even 

more, challenging individual state or multi-state negotiated price reporting consistency. 

Formula purchases increased from about 35% to more than 60% of slaughter cattle purchases

since 2008. Furthermore, in recent years several packing plants have changed ownership; some 

plants have ceased operations; others have substantially expanded capacity; and large packerowned cattle feedyards have been sold to non-packing entities. These structural changes all 

directly influence reporting of negotiated fed cattle purchases especially regionally by 

modifying the makeup of firms and purchase shares driving 3/70/20 confidentiality. No formal 

assessment has been made to determine how these, and other changes occurring in cattle 

market structure, have impacted negotiated fed cattle market information reporting.

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

Percentage of Marketings

Week

Figure 1. Ways Domestic Fed Cattle are Purchased and Priced, 

Weekly, 2005- August 2019

Negotiated Negotiated Grid Formula Forward Contract

Source: USDA, AMS
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The weekly 5-Area weighted average negotiated dressed steer price over the 2014-18 is 

reported in Figure 2. Apparent is the variation in prices ranging from $270/cwt in early 2015 to 

less than $155/cwt in late 2016. The variability in price reinforces the importance of regular, 

accessible, and reliable price data informing industry participants of recent market information. 

Rapidly evolving industry market structure together with volatile prices challenges price 

reporting, further motivating this study. 

100.00

120.00

140.00

160.00

180.00

200.00

220.00

240.00

260.00

280.00

01/05/14 01/05/15 01/05/16 01/05/17 01/05/18

Dressed Price ($/cwt)

Date

Figure 2. 5-Area Weighted-Average Weekly Dressed Steer Price, 2014-2018

Source: USDA AMS
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Objectives The main purpose of this study is to assess the feasibility of reporting negotiated slaughter 

steer and heifer purchases in separate 0-14 and 15-30 day delivery windows through possible 

realignment of the 5-Area reporting markets while maintaining confidentiality of reporting 

entities and proprietary transactions.

Objectives include: 

1. To determine whether transaction data for 0-14 day and 15-30 day delivery period 

negotiated trade prices can be consistently reported separately on national and regional 

bases while complying with 3/70/20 confidentiality guidelines.

2. To determine how possible changes in the 5-Area reporting region through realignment 

of included states of cattle origin influence the feasibility of consistently reporting the 

two delivery window negotiated trade prices separately while complying with 3/70/20 

confidentiality guidelines. This objective includes assessing how adding cattle from 

selected additional states of origin to existing 5-Area reporting regions might impact 

confidentiality constraints as well as the quality of price information being reported by 

AMS.

3. To outline options for consideration and suggestions that may improve reporting 

negotiated slaughter steer and heifer purchases.

Procedures To accomplish the objectives of this project, we first met with AMS market news personnel 

from the Des Moines and St. Joseph regional offices to review details of negotiated transaction 

fed cattle purchase data. We also obtained five years (2014-18) of national transaction data 

reported to AMS through LMR for negotiated purchases. We conducted a baseline analysis

followed by assessing alternative alignments of the regions included in the 5-Area reports. 

Baseline Analysis 

Statistical analyses of negotiated beef cattle steer and heifer transactions data were used to 

assess how confidentiality guidelines impact consistency of price reporting now for the 

individual reporting regions and the 5-Area report for 0-30, 0-14, and 15-30 day delivery 

windows. The analysis included assessing how including 15-30 day delivery with the 0-14 

impacts reported weighted-average prices over time, frequency of price reporting consistency, 

and trend in consistent reporting conditional on the 3/70/20 confidentiality guidelines for the 

current 5-Area reporting regions and the combined 5-Area using states of origin included in 

current reporting. The baseline analysis served as a benchmark for understanding how 

alternative alignments of including additional states of cattle origins might impact price 

reporting consistency.
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Alternative Alignments 

To determine how the individual regional and 5-Area negotiated price reporting consistency 

would be affected under alternative regional market alignment, we evaluated how price 

reporting was impacted by adding more states of cattle origin to individual price reporting 

regions and the 5-Area. Candidate states of origin were ranked initially by volume of negotiated 

purchased cattle from each state. Markets not included in the current 5-Area report that had

the largest negotiated number of transactions and cattle volume represented were the most 

highly ranked in this first step. 

Useful in this first step of assessing candidate states to potentially include in alternative market 

information reporting realignments is to review locations of cattle on feed inventory. In Figure 3 

we used 2017 Census of Agriculture data to estimate cattle on feed density (head per square 

mile) by county across the mainland US (excluding AK and HI). Because of confidentiality, cattle 

on feed inventory is not reported in Census publications in several counties (shaded in gray on 

the map). Cattle feeding is densely concentrated in the IA, IL, CO, SD, NE, KS, and TX regions 

though certainly not spread uniformly across these states. 

Transaction prices from candidate states of origin to include in an alternative alignment 

assessment were statistically compared to any potential region they might be considered being 

combined with to assess impact on the following metrics:

1. Transaction numbers and cattle volumes included, 

2. Impact on ability to report weighted average prices sensitive to 3/70/20,

3. Reported weighted-average price levels, and

4. Price variability.

For example, we considered adding SD to the NE data to determine how this influenced the 

relevant metrics. It is possible that including SD transactions together with NE transactions

could improve all the characteristics we measure of price reporting. Alternatively, this 

realignment could reduce the quality of the existing NE report if transaction prices in SD are not 

well aligned or integrated with transaction prices in NE over time. Statistical analysis is 

necessary over the 5-year period to make an informed assessment. Important to recognize is 

there are quantity of transactions in included packer buying regions that impact 3/70/20 

constraints as well as how any possible realignment might impact the quality of reported 

market information. Our study was designed to assess these essential components of potential 

market information reporting. 
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Figure 3. Estimated 2017 Cattle on Feed Density by County 

Source: Estimated from 2017 Census of Agriculture data. We acknowledge Justin Bina for preparing this chart. 
12 | Page

Results 

Data Filters Applied 

Prior to conducting analyses in this section, we applied several filters to the original data files 

provided to us by AMS. These filters included:

1. Negotiated Grid Net and Negotiated Grid Base purchase types were dropped so only 

negotiated cash purchases remained,

2. Transactions representing less than 11 head (consistent with AMS procedures) or more 

than 6,000 head were dropped,

3. Transactions having missing source of origin state were dropped,

4. Only Steers, Heifers, and Steer/Heifer Mixed (non-dairy) purchase classes were retained,

5. Transactions with average live weight<800 or >2000 lbs were dropped,

6. Transactions with average dressing percentage<50 or >70 were dropped,

7. Transactions with live price < $30/cwt or dressed price < $40/cwt were dropped, and

8. Transactions that were not domestic purchases were not included in analysis 

conducted. 

To identify candidate states or cattle purchase origins to potentially add to, or combine with, 

existing 5-Area fed cattle negotiated market information reporting we calculated the number of 

negotiated transactions, head purchased, and market shares for the 13 largest volume states 

and NM (included because it is part of the current TX/OK/NM AMS market report). In assessing 

alternative regional negotiated transactions, we combined all negotiated purchases of:

Purchase Classes:

Steers

Heifers

Mixed Steer/Heifer

Selling Basis:

Live

Dressed

Both FOB and Delivered purchases were included for both live and dressed

Table 1 summarizes results of negotiated trade volumes over the 2014-18 period. For the 0-30 

day transactions, NE had the largest number of transactions with more than 58,000 comprising

more than 9 million head representing a 37% share of total domestic negotiated purchases. IA 

was next with some 47,000 transactions, over 5 million head, and a 21% share followed by KS 

with 34,000 transactions, more than 4 million head, representing a 17% market share. SD, a 

state not currently included in one of the major 5-Area reporting regions was the 4th largest 

volume state in the negotiated market with over 13,000 transactions, 1.7 million head, with 

almost a 7% share. This alone provides motivation to consider combining SD transactions with 
13 | Page

another market in regional reporting, as currently SD transactions are not included in the 

weekly 5-Area or individual regional reports. However, with such significant volume, including 

SD negotiated purchases would significantly increase regional reporting volume.

Geographically, where the bulk of negotiated trade has occurred in recent years is highly 

concentrated. The market shares of 0-30 day negotiated purchases for the states listed in Table 

1 are summarized in Figure 4. NE had the largest share represented at 37% followed by IA at 

21%, and KS at 17%. The 5 largest volume states (in share-ranked order NE, IA, KS, SD, and TX) 

accounted for 86% of the national negotiated purchases. Adding MN and CO to the largest 5 

volume states, cumulatively accounted for 93% of negotiated purchases. Finally, next in line for 

volume was IL which if included resulted in the largest 8 states representing 96% of negotiated 

purchase volume. This geographic concentration illustrates from at a volumetric basis where 

the depth of market information for negotiated transactions has been present, suggesting areas 

of most importance in negotiated purchases market information reporting.

Also noteworthy in Table 1, purchases within the 0-14 day delivery window are much more 

common than the 15-30 day window. Nationally, 85% of domestic negotiated purchases over 

the 2014-2018 period were 0-14 day and 15% were 15-30 day delivery windows. Furthermore, 

in some prominent cattle feeding states, the 15-30 day delivery purchases represent tiny, if any,

trade volume. For example, only 3% of negotiated transactions in TX and in KS were 15-30 day 

delivery window over the 5-year horizon. NE and IA represent the largest majority of 15-30 day 

delivery window purchases with 63% of the entire national 15-30 day negotiated purchase

transactions (71% by cattle volume) originating in just these two states over the 2014-18 

period. This clearly illustrates potential difficulty of reporting purchases for 15-30 day delivery 

window separately in some regions such as TX or KS where they sparsely occur. However, if 

data from states are combined for regional reporting purposes, this could alleviate some of the 

confidentiality challenges with reporting 0-14 and 15-30 day purchases separately. We explore 

that specific question subsequently in this report. 

Weekly shares of 0-14 day and 15-30 delivery purchases nationally over the 2014-18 period are 

summarized in Figure 5. During more than 80% of weeks, 0-14 delivery purchases represented 

at least 75% of weekly volume (head) purchased in the negotiated market. Figure 6 reports the 

same information as Figure 5 aggregated to an annual basis. No apparent trend is present, 

though during 2018, 19% of negotiated volume was represented by 15-30 day delivery 

purchases, the most of any of the five years. However, we would want to see data from post2018 before we would conclude the share of 15-30 day purchases are trending upward. 
14 | Page

Table 1. Number of Transactions, Total Head, and Shares of Head Transacted in Negotiated Domestic Market by State of Cattle Producer, 

2014-2018 (Steers, Heifers, and Mixed Steers/Heifers combined; Dressed and Live combined; 0-30 day Delivery combined)

2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2014-18 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2014-18 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2014-18

States

CO

0-30 999 711 1,286 1,568 1,046 5,613 150,386 107,516 216,319 269,732 201,010 944,963 3.4% 2.6% 4.2% 4.9% 3.4% 3.8%

0-14 977 680 1,208 1,368 893 5,129 147,243 101,822 202,434 232,389 170,614 854,502 3.3% 2.5% 3.9% 4.2% 2.9% 3.4%

15-30 22 31 78 200 153 484 3,143 5,694 13,885 37,343 30,396 90,461 0.1% 0.1% 0.3% 0.7% 0.5% 0.4%

IA

0-30 10,270 9,194 7,967 8,923 10,664 47,047 1,109,924 1,034,694 866,555 952,678 1,242,281 5,206,132 25.0% 25.5% 16.7% 17.3% 20.8% 20.7%

0-14 8,578 7,759 6,296 7,297 8,419 38,376 892,664 849,393 646,398 723,589 932,485 4,044,529 20.1% 20.9% 12.5% 13.2% 15.6% 16.1%

15-30 1,692 1,435 1,671 1,626 2,245 8,671 217,260 185,301 220,157 229,089 309,796 1,161,603 4.9% 4.6% 4.2% 4.2% 5.2% 4.6%

IL

0-30 2,115 1,938 1,503 1,924 2,336 9,817 131,636 123,471 94,158 108,283 128,175 585,723 3.0% 3.0% 1.8% 2.0% 2.1% 2.3%

0-14 1,475 1,482 984 1,549 2,024 7,513 92,933 91,791 59,363 85,245 109,694 439,026 2.1% 2.3% 1.1% 1.6% 1.8% 1.7%

15-30 640 456 519 375 312 2,304 38,703 31,680 34,795 23,038 18,481 146,697 0.9% 0.8% 0.7% 0.4% 0.3% 0.6%

IN

0-30 436 444 427 444 469 2,226 23,392 22,430 20,087 20,903 22,299 109,111 0.5% 0.6% 0.4% 0.4% 0.4% 0.4%

0-14 332 324 249 325 346 1,582 17,840 16,394 11,448 15,338 15,770 76,790 0.4% 0.4% 0.2% 0.3% 0.3% 0.3%

15-30 104 120 178 119 123 644 5,552 6,036 8,639 5,565 6,529 32,321 0.1% 0.1% 0.2% 0.1% 0.1% 0.1%

KS

0-30 5,200 4,484 8,355 8,486 7,505 34,036 599,020 508,903 1,034,565 1,048,716 1,019,708 4,210,912 13.5% 12.5% 19.9% 19.1% 17.1% 16.7%

0-14 4,912 4,320 8,264 8,078 7,348 32,928 565,450 492,609 1,026,187 1,000,994 995,774 4,081,014 12.7% 12.1% 19.8% 18.2% 16.7% 16.2%

15-30 288 164 91 408 157 1,108 33,570 16,294 8,378 47,722 23,934 129,898 0.8% 0.4% 0.2% 0.9% 0.4% 0.5%

MN

0-30 1,268 1,240 1,383 1,640 1,736 7,268 171,457 172,742 187,606 222,255 239,300 993,360 3.9% 4.3% 3.6% 4.0% 4.0% 3.9%

0-14 1,142 1,070 944 1,226 1,228 5,611 149,146 142,067 121,779 151,541 149,616 714,149 3.4% 3.5% 2.3% 2.8% 2.5% 2.8%

15-30 126 170 439 414 508 1,657 22,311 30,675 65,827 70,714 89,684 279,211 0.5% 0.8% 1.3% 1.3% 1.5% 1.1%

NE

0-30 11,182 10,932 12,261 12,322 11,871 58,590 1,732,512 1,543,532 1,937,454 1,945,105 2,170,529 9,329,132 39.0% 38.0% 37.4% 35.4% 36.3% 37.1%

0-14 10,006 9,591 10,762 10,141 9,004 49,526 1,503,907 1,356,439 1,682,850 1,577,689 1,659,399 7,780,284 33.8% 33.4% 32.4% 28.7% 27.8% 30.9%

15-30 1,176 1,341 1,499 2,181 2,867 9,064 228,605 187,093 254,604 367,416 511,130 1,548,848 5.1% 4.6% 4.9% 6.7% 8.6% 6.2%

NM

0-30 2 2 4 18 1 27 104 140 265 1,863 74 2,446 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

0-14 2 2 4 11 1 20 104 140 265 934 74 1,517 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

15-30 - - - 7 - 7 - - - 929 - 929 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

OH

0-30 512 414 391 554 577 2,452 23,710 20,320 19,587 25,465 26,514 115,596 0.5% 0.5% 0.4% 0.5% 0.4% 0.5%

0-14 475 372 327 466 493 2,137 22,044 18,550 16,488 21,389 22,421 100,892 0.5% 0.5% 0.3% 0.4% 0.4% 0.4%

15-30 37 42 64 88 84 315 1,666 1,770 3,099 4,076 4,093 14,704 0.0% 0.0% 0.1% 0.1% 0.1% 0.1%

Domestic Transactions Total Domestic Head Market Share (% of Total Domestic Head)
15 | Page

Table 1. Continued

2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2014-18 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2014-18 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2014-18

States Domestic Transactions Total Domestic Head Market Share (% of Total Domestic Head)

OK

0-30 116 127 375 527 347 1,493 12,706 14,224 34,805 58,740 32,974 153,449 0.3% 0.4% 0.7% 1.1% 0.6% 0.6%

0-14 110 121 374 501 345 1,452 10,953 13,757 34,694 55,804 32,768 147,976 0.2% 0.3% 0.7% 1.0% 0.5% 0.6%

15-30 6 6 1 26 2 41 1,753 467 111 2,936 206 5,473 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.1% 0.0% 0.0%

SD

0-30 2,246 2,420 2,989 2,655 3,056 13,372 263,558 300,454 378,709 332,318 422,634 1,697,673 5.9% 7.4% 7.3% 6.0% 7.1% 6.7%

0-14 1,963 2,117 2,596 2,260 2,420 11,361 224,108 258,651 330,447 283,835 326,516 1,423,557 5.0% 6.4% 6.4% 5.2% 5.5% 5.7%

15-30 283 303 393 395 636 2,011 39,450 41,803 48,262 48,483 96,118 274,116 0.9% 1.0% 0.9% 0.9% 1.6% 1.1%

TX

0-30 763 717 2,093 2,721 2,359 8,653 111,860 93,293 258,323 365,595 295,191 1,124,262 2.5% 2.3% 5.0% 6.6% 4.9% 4.5%

0-14 683 679 2,079 2,615 2,304 8,360 93,441 87,768 256,526 350,394 285,707 1,073,836 2.1% 2.2% 4.9% 6.4% 4.8% 4.3%

15-30 80 38 14 106 55 293 18,419 5,525 1,797 15,201 9,484 50,426 0.4% 0.1% 0.0% 0.3% 0.2% 0.2%

WI

0-30 397 288 279 432 550 1,947 15,396 15,100 15,488 22,551 30,226 98,761 0.3% 0.4% 0.3% 0.4% 0.5% 0.4%

0-14 313 231 207 378 489 1,619 11,349 11,578 9,973 18,695 26,296 77,891 0.3% 0.3% 0.2% 0.3% 0.4% 0.3%

15-30 84 57 72 54 61 328 4,047 3,522 5,515 3,856 3,930 20,870 0.1% 0.1% 0.1% 0.1% 0.1% 0.1%

WY

0-30 227 280 327 309 235 1,378 44,150 50,996 66,934 58,770 51,694 272,544 1.0% 1.3% 1.3% 1.1% 0.9% 1.1%

0-14 226 272 314 304 223 698 43,824 48,963 64,740 58,326 49,521 265,374 1.0% 1.2% 1.2% 1.1% 0.8% 1.1%

15-30 1 8 13 5 12 680 326 2,033 2,194 444 2,173 7,170 0.0% 0.1% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

All Other

0-30 755 787 814 1,066 1,215 4,640 53,225 54,805 56,393 66,504 90,521 321,448 1.2% 1.3% 1.1% 1.2% 1.5% 1.3%

0-14 698 713 696 956 1,099 4,165 49,178 48,592 46,461 58,649 81,526 284,406 1.1% 1.2% 0.9% 1.1% 1.4% 1.1%

15-30 57 74 118 110 116 475 4,047 6,213 9,932 7,855 8,995 37,042 0.1% 0.2% 0.2% 0.1% 0.2% 0.1%

All States

0-30 36,488 33,978 40,454 43,589 43,967 198,559 4,443,036 4,062,620 5,187,248 5,499,478 5,973,130 25,165,512 100.0% 100.0% 100.0% 100.0% 100.0% 100.0%

0-14 31,892 29,733 35,304 37,475 36,636 170,477 3,824,184 3,538,514 4,510,053 4,634,811 4,858,181 21,365,743 86.1% 87.1% 86.9% 84.3% 81.3% 84.9%

15-30 4,596 4,245 5,150 6,114 7,331 28,082 618,852 524,106 677,195 864,667 1,114,949 3,799,769 13.9% 12.9% 13.1% 15.7% 18.7% 15.1%
16 | Page

Figure 4. Shares of 0-30 Day Negotiated Purchase Volume, 2014-2018

3.8%

CO

20.7%

IA

2.3%

IL

0.4%

IN

16.7%

KS

3.9%

MN

37.1%

NE

0.0%

NM

0.5%

OH

0.6%

OK

6.7%

SD

4.5%

TX

0.4%

WI

1.1%

WY

1.3%

others
17 | Page

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

100%

Share of Negotiated Purchases (%)

Week

Figure 5. Weekly Shares of 0-14 Day and 15-30 Day Negotiated Purchases, 

Nationally, 2014-2018

0-14 Day

15-30 Day

86% 87% 87% 84% 81%

14% 13% 13% 16% 19%

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

100%

2014 2015 2016 2017 2018

Share of Negotiated Purchases (%)

Year

Figure 6. Annual Shares of 0-14 Day and 15-30 Day Negotiated Pruchases, 

Nationally, 2014-2018

15-30 Day

0-14 Day
18 | Page

Alternative Market Region Alignments We explored several alternative regional market alignments to assess how 3/70/20 

confidentiality guidelines would have influenced information reporting over the 2014-2018 

period. LMR data identifies the origin state of cattle with no further refinement in specific origin 

location within a state. An argument could be made for considering splitting cattle purchases 

from any particular state into different reporting regions (e.g., eastern NE with western IA or 

western KS with eastern CO), but current LMR reporting protocol precludes such assessments. 

As such, alternative market reporting region alignments are constrained to consider only

alternative, whole states of origin. We selected and tested 10 alternative origin alignments to 

assess how they would have impacted confidentiality guidelines for reporting 0-14, 15-30, and 

0-30 day reporting windows.

The following criteria guided our selection of alternative alignments to consider:

1. Geographic proximity – only contiguous states were considered candidates to combine, 

they did not need to be all contiguous to each other, but contiguous to at least one 

state in the grouping.

2. Market share – only states having sufficient negotiated volume, as identified separately 

in Table 1, were considered candidates to include in potential re-alignments. We see 

little value in including states with insignificant negotiated volume in any potential 

realignment because of the limited impact on the quantity or quality of market 

information including additional states provides.

3. Reliable price data – only states where we deemed reported price data were reliable, or 

where if apparent data errors were present, we could correct or drop them from further 

analyses, were considered as candidates to combine with other state or origin data.

Alternative market regions considered are summarized in Table 2 and Figure 7 illustrates these 

alignments in US maps. Alignment 1 is the current regional market reporting by AMS. Each 

subsequent alterative regional alignment modifies the origin states to enable us to determine 

how these realignments affect confidentiality guideline reporting constraints. Important to 

recognize is that some of these potential realignments can be assessed independently and 

others cannot. For example, the IA/MN Alignment 1, can be evaluated alone or compared with 

any other alignment option below without consideration of any of the other regions. This is 

because the only states included in the alternative alignments that include IA/MN are not 

included in any other region (one exception to this is Alignment 2, because we move SD around 

to other regions in other alignments).
19 | Page

Table 2. Alternative Alignments for Regional Market Reporting Considered

Alignment Region 1 Region 2 Region 3 Region 4 Region 5

1 IA/MN NE KS TX/OK/NM CO

2 IA/MN/SD/IL NE/CO/WY KS/TX/OK/NM

3 IA/MN/IL/IN/OH NE CO/WY/SD KS TX/OK/NM

4 IA/MN/IL/IN/OH NE/SD CO/WY KS TX/OK/NM

5 IA/MN/IL/IN/OH NE CO/WY/SD KS/TX/OK/NM

6 IA/MN/IL/IN/OH NE/SD CO/WY KS/TX/OK/NM

7 IA/MN/IL/IN/OH NE/CO/WY/SD KS TX/OK/NM

8 IA/MN/IL/IN/OH NE/SD KS/CO/WY TX/OK/NM

9 IA/MN/IL/IN/OH NE/SD/WY KS TX/OK/NM/CO

10 IA/MN/IL/IN/OH NE/CO/WY/SD KS/TX/OK/NM

In Region 1, we originally considered including WI as well as the other listed states in 

Alignments 3-10. However, reported transaction prices in the WI data were problematic. 

Frequent apparent data recording errors in WI data with no clear way to fix, resulted in us not 

being able to use these data in alternative regional alignments. Table 3 illustrates the 

magnitude of problems with the WI data where the average coefficient of variation in weekly 

reported prices was more than three times the magnitude of any other state included in the 

alternative regional alignments. WI typically had only about 7 negotiated transactions per week 

in the non-dairy Steers, Heifers, and Mixed Steers/Heifers categories. As such, using filters to 

delete problematic data in the WI market would result in too few transactions per week to be 

informative. WI only represented 0.4% of negotiated purchase volume (Figure 4), the 13th

largest. So, dropping WI data does not materially affect volume in any alternative alignment.
20 | Page

Table 3. Simple Average of Weekly Coefficient of 

Variation of Negotiated Transaction Prices, 2014-2018

Average

Coefficient of

Variation

Weeks with of Negotiated

Negotiated Prices

State Transactions (%)

CO 254 1.27

IA 260 1.31

IL 260 1.67

IN 260 1.56

KS 260 1.09

MN 260 1.79

NE 260 1.10

NM 13 0.46

OH 260 1.88

OK 227 0.99

SD 260 1.26

TX 256 1.01

WI 258 5.73

WY 251 0.78
21 | Page

Figure 7. Alternative Regional Market Alignments
22 | Page

Figure 7 continued
23 | Page

Figure 7 continued
24 | Page

Confidentiality for Alternative Market Alignments The alternative market alignments were evaluated to determine how confidentiality guidelines 

for market reporting would impact 0-14, 15-30, and 0-30 day purchase window information 

over the 2014-18 period. In this assessment we maintained combining transactions that include 

Steers, Heifers, and Mixed Steers/Heifers; and dressed and live purchases that were either 

delivered or FOB. As such, the confidentiality guideline assessment conducted here determines

how confidentiality guidelines would have impacted composite market information reporting 

for this aggregated set of purchase types. Separating genders and/or live/dressed purchase 

methods would increase the likelihood of confidentiality guidelines not allowing market 

information reporting relative to what we report here. 

Figure 8 illustrates how for just Steers (charts for Heifers and Mixed Steers/Heifers would be 

equivalent), the number of possible categories of market reporting quickly expand to numerous 

reports as one considers the different combinations of transaction characteristics. If for 

example, AMS were to report each sex, live or dressed, delivery options, and days forward 

windows, the number of different weighted average prices potentially reportable for a single 

market area would be 24 (3 genders × 2 weight bases × 2 delivery options × 2 delivery windows)

ignoring quality grade breakdowns which would make this number even larger. However, the 

tradeoff to more granular reporting is confidentiality guidelines rapidly prevent reporting for 

many of the 24 categories. Therefore, combining categories becomes essential to being able to 

regularly report market information. 

Steers

Live

FOB

0-14 days

15-30 days

Delivered

0-14 days

15-30 days

Dressed

FOB

0-14 days

15-30 days

Delivered

0-14 days

15-30 days

Figure 8. Illustration of how Market Reporting Categories Expand with Transaction Types
25 | Page

Table 4 further illustrates how numbers of negotiated transactions and percentage of weeks 

with reportable market information conditional on confidentiality guidelines are affected by 

data aggregation (i.e., alternative paths in Figure 8). All transactions for Steers, Heifers, Mixed 

Steers/Heifers; Dressed and Live (both Delivered and FOB); and 0-30 Day delivery are the 

starting point for the information in Table 4. This is the most fully aggregated negotiated 

purchases data for each market region. Each subsequent summary information breaks the 

aggregate data into progressively smaller data subsets. For example, “Steers” drops Heifers and 

Mixed Steers/Heifers but retains the rest of the aggregation. “Dressed Delivered Steers” further 

drops from “Steers” all live and any FOB dressed purchases. The final two filters in Table 4

report the “Dressed Delivered Steers” broken down into 0-14 and 15-30 day delivery windows.

Apparent in Table 4 is the number of transactions and percentages of reportable trade due to 

confidentiality both decline rapidly, especially for CO and TX/OK/NM, as further data filters are 

applied disaggregating the data into the example reporting categories (moving vertically down 

the table). For example, in CO, 87% of weeks the most highly aggregated trade is reportable 

over the 2014-18 period but this drops to 69% if Heifers and Mixed transactions are filtered out 

and to 0% if live transactions are filtered out so that only Dressed Delivered Steers are included. 

In contrast, in NE, where dressed purchases are much more common, reportable trade remains 

viable until one filters down to just Dressed Delivered Steers 15-30 Day delivery window where 

only 8% of weeks have reportable trade.

There are several important implications of the information summarized in Table 4. Market 

reporting for more disaggregated negotiated purchases by region, gender, dressed or live 

purchase, and delivery window for current market regions quickly become problematic from 

volume and confidentiality considerations. Aggregating data for market reporting purposes is 

essential. Without aggregating, especially for certain purchase types in certain market regions, 

no market information is reportable. Certainly, as will be apparent in subsequent analyses as 

well, consistently reporting market information for 0-14 and 15-30 day delivery windows 

separately is not feasible under current confidentiality guidelines, especially in regional 

markets. Important to realize is that any disaggregation of reporting market information in finer 

granularity reduces the chances of being able to report market information together for each 

category. That is, disaggregation adversely affects reportability for all disaggregated categories. 

Fed cattle are being marketed in different ways across different regional markets. This is not 

news to anyone who participates in these markets. However, it certainly challenges consistent 

market information reporting. With different ways negotiated fed cattle are being traded, what 

might work well for reporting different breakdowns of market information in one region, will 

result in many blank market reports in another market region. Standardized reports across 

market regions are desirable for many reasons, but they are certainly challenged by 

heterogeneity in marketing methods without considerable data aggregation.
26 | Page

Table 4. Illustration of how Data Aggregation Impacts Transaction Numbers and 

Confidentiality Reportability, 2014-2018

Data Aggregationa Market Region

NE IA/MN KS CO TX/OK/NM

All 

Transactions 58,590 54,315 34,036 5,613 10,173

% of weeks trade reportable 100 100 100 87 85

Steers

Transactions 31,610 27,299 16,094 3,011 4,952

% of weeks trade reportable 100 100 100 69 68

Dressed Delivered Steers

Transactions 16,815 12,077 658 127 6

% of weeks trade reportable 100 100 1 0 0

0-14 Days Dressed Delivered Steers

Transactions 13,266 9,542 539 120 6

% of weeks trade reportable 98 99 0 0 0

15-30 Days Dressed Delivered Steers

Transactions 3,549 2,535 119 7 0

% of weeks trade reportable 8 28 0 0 0

a All combines Steers, Heifers, Mixed Steers/Heifers; Dressed and Live (both FOB and 

Delivered); and 0-30 day delivery window

Steers includes Steers; Dressed and Live (both FOB and Delivered); and 0-30 day delivery 

window

Dressed Delivered Steers includes Steers; Dressed Delivered; and 0-30 day delivery window

0-14 Days Dressed Delivered Steers includes Steers; Dressed Delivered; and 

0-14 day delivery window

15-30 Days Dressed Delivered Steers includes Steers; Dressed Delivered; and 

0-14 day delivery window
27 | Page

Table 5, reported on the ensuing pages, summarizes confidentiality guideline market reporting 

analyses for the 0-14, 15-30, and 0-30 delivery window negotiated purchases across the current 

and alternative market alignments presented in Table 2. Because of the amount of information 

contained in Table 5, it spans several pages with each page presenting results for an alternative 

market alignment from Table 2. All confidentiality guideline assessments reported in Table 5

are made with the aggregated negotiated transactions for each region that include Steers, 

Heifers, Mixed Steers/Heifers; and Live and Dressed (FOB and Delivered). These aggregated 

transactions are evaluated across 0-30, 0-14, and 15-30 day delivery windows for selected 

alternative potential market reporting alignments. Important to realize is that with the 

aggregations we have used here any disaggregation by breaking the information down by sex or 

dressed/live, etc. would certainly reduce data reportability due to confidentiality constraints 

relative to what is contained in Table 5. 

The first alignment in Table 5 is for current regional market reporting by AMS with the 5 

regional markets and the national domestic market. For most of the current market region 

designations, the 0-30 day market information is generally reportable every year. IA/MN, NE,

and KS all had 100% of weeks with reportable data for this trading window. However, reporting 

for CO and TX/OK/NM regions is more frequently constrained with CO only being reportable 

87% of weeks and TX/OK/NM only 85% of weeks over the entire 5-year period. For IA/MN, NE, 

and KS market information for 0-14 day is 100% reportable. However, CO and TX/OK/NM are 

somewhat constrained with 79% and 83% reportable weeks. The 15-30 day reporting is more 

problematic across all market regions including the national domestic market. While being 

reportable just under half of the weeks in IA/MN, it is only reportable 18% of weeks in NE, and 

never reportable in KS, CO, or TX/OK/NM.
28 | Page

Table 5. Confidentiality Guidelines Impact on Reportable Trade, 2014*-2018

Alignment 1

Region / Delivery 

Window 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2014-18

% of Weeks Trade Reportable

IA/MN 

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 59% 21% 0% 63% 90% 46%

NE 

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 36% 43% 18%

CO 

0-30 Day 78% 85% 85% 100% 85% 87%

0-14 Day 66% 73% 77% 100% 77% 79%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0%

KS 

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0%

TX/OK/NM

0-30 Day 90% 47% 90% 100% 100% 85%

0-14 Day 85% 40% 90% 100% 100% 83%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0%

5-Area

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 93% 12% 14% 62% 75% 50%

National Domestic

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 93% 52% 14% 62% 75% 58%

*2014 excludes first 11 weeks of data because confidentiality guidelines require 

12 weeks of data.
29 | Page

The alternative market alignments considered attempt to address challenges with reporting 0-

14 and 15-30 day data separately. Alignment 2 adds SD and IL to IA/MN; combines NE/CO/WY 

and combines KS/TX/OK/NM. This is the most condensed reporting region alignment (similar to 

Alignment 10 discussed later) of any we consider with only three regions. As such, this is a 

highly regionally aggregated reporting alternative. This reporting alignment would enable more 

reportable frequency across each region than the current alignment (Alignment 1) as 100% of 

0-30 and 0-14 day trade weeks are reportable in each region. However, 15-30 day is still highly 

constrained, especially in the NE/CO/WY and the KS/TX/OK/NM with less than 20% of weeks 

over the five-year period being reportable. 

Table 5. Continued

Alignment 2

2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2014-18

% of Weeks Trade Reportable

IA/MN/SD/IL

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 73% 57% 0% 63% 90% 56%

NE/CO/WY

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 37% 44% 19%

KS/TX/OK/NM

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 24% 0% 0% 0% 0% 5%
30 | Page

Alignment 3 contains five market regions similar to current AMS reporting but it adds more 

states to the IA/MN and the CO regions. For IA/MN, IL/IN/OH are added as what could be 

considered major Corn Belt markets to increase represented regional negotiated volume 

traded. Because of clear challenges in reporting CO independently, it was combined with WY 

and SD. The other regions remain the same as in Alignment 1. The IA/MN/IL/IN/OH region has 

nearly the same confidentiality status as the IA/MN region simply because the bulk of the 

volume of this region is represented by IA and MN. IA and MN represent 85% of the negotiated 

volume (head) over the 5-year period of this 5-state region. For this region, 100% of the 0-30 

and 0-14 day weeks are reportable and just under 50% of 15-30 day is reportable. For the 

CO/WY/SD market 100% of the 0-30 and 0-14 day weekly information is reportable, but only 7% 

of the 15-30 day is reportable (CO alone had 0%). 

Table 5. Continued

Alignment 3

2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2014-18

% of Weeks Trade Reportable

IA/MN/IL/IN/OH

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 51% 57% 0% 62% 78% 49%

NE

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 36% 43% 18%

CO/WY/SD

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 4% 27% 7%

KS

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0%

TX/OK/NM

0-30 Day 90% 47% 90% 100% 100% 85%

0-14 Day 85% 40% 90% 100% 100% 83%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0%
31 | Page

Alignment 4 is identical to 3 except SD is combined with NE instead of CO/WY. This enables 

assessment of how much including SD transactions alone with CO resolved issues with 

confidentiality. There may be some argument that SD fed cattle are similar to NE given 

geographic proximity and cattle feeding environments. CO/WY performs much like CO, which is 

not surprising given CO represents 78% of the negotiated volume (head) of the combined 

CO/WY region. As such, CO/WY behaves much like CO alone with most 0-30 and 0-14 day trade 

reportable and no 15-30 day reportable. There is a noticeable improvement in 0-14 day 

reportability for CO by adding WY as it increases from 87% (Alignment 1) to 93% of reportable 

weeks. NE/SD performs about the same as NE alone which is not surprising as NE represents 

85% of the volume (head). 

Table 5. Continued

Alignment 4

2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2014-18

% of Weeks Trade Reportable

IA/MN/IL/IN/OH

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 51% 57% 0% 62% 78% 49%

NE/SD

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 8% 55% 43% 20%

CO/WY

0-30 Day 98% 90% 90% 100% 87% 93%

0-14 Day 83% 90% 90% 100% 87% 90%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0%

KS

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0%

TX/OK/NM

0-30 Day 90% 47% 90% 100% 100% 85%

0-14 Day 85% 40% 90% 100% 100% 83%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0%
32 | Page

Alignment 5 goes back to CO/WY/SD of Alignment 3, but combines KS/TX/OK/NM. Part of the 

motivation for considering this alignment is it attempts to address both the TX/OK/NM and CO 

challenges. The KS/TX/OK/NM performs nearly identical to KS alone. Since KS had full 

reportability for 0-30 and 0-14 day but none for 15-30 day, this is essentially what shows up in 

the combined alignment with only slight increase to 5% of weekly trades reportable for 15-30 

day.

Table 5. Continued

Alignment 5

2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2014-18

% of Weeks Trade Reportable

IA/MN/IL/IN/OH

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 51% 57% 0% 62% 78% 49%

NE

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 36% 43% 18%

CO/WY/SD

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 4% 27% 7%

KS/TX/OK/NM

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 24% 0% 0% 0% 0% 5%
33 | Page

Alignment 6 contains alignments already considered in previous alignments, just in different 

combinations. This alignment is the same as Alignment 4 except it combines KS/TX/OK/NM into 

one region. Nothing noteworthy is revealed from this alignment not already discussed in 

Alignment 4 and Alignment 5. Problems in reporting 15-30 day persist in this alignment for 

NE/SD, CO/WY, and KS/TX/OK/NM.

Table 5. Continued

Alignment 6

2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2014-18

% of Weeks Trade Reportable

IA/MN/IL/IN/OH

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 51% 57% 0% 62% 78% 49%

NE/SD

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 8% 55% 43% 20%

CO/WY

0-30 Day 98% 90% 90% 100% 87% 93%

0-14 Day 83% 90% 90% 100% 87% 90%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0%

KS/TX/OK/NM

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 24% 0% 0% 0% 0% 5%
34 | Page

Alignment 7 reverts to having KS and TX/OK/NM as separate reporting regions but combines 

NE/CO/WY/SD into a single region. This new alignment again looks similar to NE alone though 

reportability for 15-30 does increase in some years (e.g., 36% to 55% in 2017), but remains 

similar (18% vs. 24%) across the overall five years.

Table 5. Continued

Alignment 7

2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2014-18

% of Weeks Trade Reportable

IA/MN/IL/IN/OH

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 51% 57% 0% 62% 78% 49%

NE/CO/WY/SD

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 10% 55% 44% 24%

KS

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0%

TX/OK/NM

0-30 Day 90% 47% 90% 100% 100% 85%

0-14 Day 85% 40% 90% 100% 100% 83%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0%
35 | Page

Alignment 8 is identical to Alignment 6 with one change; KS is moved from the TX/OK/NM 

region to the CO/WY region so a KS/CO/WY is considered as a new possible alignment. This 

alignment ends up with KS/CO/WY being nearly identical to KS alone. Since, KS represents 78% 

of the negotiated volume (head) this was expected. 

Table 5. Continued

Alignment 8

2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2014-18

% of Weeks Trade Reportable

IA/MN/IL/IN/OH

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 51% 57% 0% 62% 78% 49%

NE/SD

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 8% 55% 43% 20%

KS/CO/WY

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 0% 5% 1%

TX/OK/NM

0-30 Day 90% 47% 90% 100% 100% 85%

0-14 Day 85% 40% 90% 100% 100% 83%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0%
36 | Page

Alignment 9 is novel in that NE is combined with SD and WY (NE/SD/WY) and TX/OK/NM/CO 

are combined. NE/SD/WY, as expected, performs nearly identical to NE alone. TX/OK/NM/CO is 

appealing in that nearly all 0-30 and 0-14 day weekly information is reportable. This is an 

increase over CO or TX/OK/NM alone where they had 80-90% reportable for these categories. 

The 15-30 day remains largely unreportable for the TX/OK/NM/CO market combination (at 6%

over the 2014-18 period). 

Table 5. Continued

Alignment 9

2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2014-18

% of Weeks Trade Reportable

IA/MN/IL/IN/OH

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 51% 57% 0% 62% 78% 49%

NE/SD/WY

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 8% 55% 43% 23%

KS

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0%

TX/OK/NM/CO

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 93% 96% 100% 100% 100% 98%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 0% 32% 6%
37 | Page

Alignment 10 is another alignment with only 3 market regions, like Alignment 2. However, the 

alternative market combinations are quite different across the two alignments. In Alignment 10 

NE/CO/WY/SD are combined as in Alignment 7 and the KS/TX/OK/NM combination like 

Alignment 6 with the IA/MN/IL/IN/OH Corn Belt alignment again repeated. Nothing noteworthy 

not already discussed is revealed from this alignment. 

Table 5. Continued

Alignment 10

2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2014-18

% of Weeks Trade Reportable

IA/MN/IL/IN/OH

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 51% 57% 0% 62% 78% 49%

NE/CO/WY/SD

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 10% 55% 44% 24%

KS/TX/OK/NM

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 24% 0% 0% 0% 0% 5%

Considering all ten alternative market region alignments, relative specifically to confidentiality,

several generalizations surface. First, 0-30 and 0-14 day reporting is relatively liquid across most 

combinations, though of the current AMS reporting regions most constrained are in CO and 

TX/OK/NM. Issues in reporting in TX/OK/NM and CO can be reduced by combining these two 

into a single reporting region without adversely impacting other regions. Combinations of other 

candidate cattle origins with TX/OK/NM such as KS, results simply in the KS/TX/OK/NM region 

mirroring the KS market where more negotiated trade occurs. 

Second, adding more states to the overall reporting regions appears worthwhile. The most 

apparently obvious market to add is SD but where best to combine it cannot be addressed 

solely from this segment of this report. This will be explored in subsequent sections more fully. 

From a confidentiality perspective, SD information could help CO and adding WY to this mix 

may have merit as well. However, SD market information may make more sense to combine 

with a region more similar to SD such as IA/MN or NE. We leave this question unanswered at 

this stage and address it more fully later. 
38 | Page

Third, we found no alignment that effectively enables reporting consistently 15-30 day window 

negotiated purchases regionally. Even where they are most prominent, in IA/MN, they still can 

only be reported about half the time. Where they are less common, KS, CO, TX, NM, OK, and 

even NE and SD, market information for 15-30 days are not reportable for these regions either 

alone or in various combinations. Stated differently, across the 10 alignments considered none 

presented a case where over the 2014-18 period all reported regions would have 15-30 

reported more than 10% of the weeks. About the only viable regions to consistently report 

separate 0-14 and 15-30 day purchases are the 5-Area or a national report. 

Statistical Price Modeling In addition to understanding how adding cattle from selected additional states of origin to 

existing 5-Area reporting regions might impact confidentiality constraints, it is important to 

understand how the quality of price information being reported by AMS might be impacted by 

realignment. A criticism of realignment might be that prices in one state or region may not 

reflect the negotiated prices in another state or region. To determine how negotiated price 

information would be affected under alternative regional market alignment, we evaluated how 

price levels and variability was impacted by adding more states of cattle origin to the price 

reporting regions. 

This price analysis complements the confidentiality guideline market reporting analyses. Recall, 

that analysis found adding more states to the overall reporting regions appeared worthwhile.

For example, the most apparently obvious market to add is SD but where best to combine it 

cannot be addressed solely from the confidentiality guideline market reporting analyses. From 

a confidentiality perspective, SD information could help CO and adding WY to this mix may have 

merit as well. However, SD market information may make more sense to combine with a region 

more similar to SD such as IA/MN or NE. Information on mean price and price variability across 

alternative alignments can aid in clarifying realignment implications on the quality of price

information. 

Before implementing any statistical price analysis, it was important to check whether outliers 

were present in the data because their existence could induce significant errors and biases.

Outliers with considerable leverage can indicate a problem with the measurement or data 

recording. In such cases, it is recommended to remove these values. But the judgement about 

this should be based on reasons external to the data. Either the values are known to be 

“impossible”, e.g. recordings of a price or dressing percent were incorrect, or other outlying but 

not-impossible values might be caused by special circumstances. It is important to note that in 

either of these cases, USDA AMS staff would have attempted to resolve the measurement or 

data recording issue and subsequently fixed the data or would have removed the data for 

reporting purposes.7

 7 For further detail on the LMR data validation process see https://www.ams.usda.gov/rulesregulations/mmr/lmr/excluded-transactions.
39 | Page

The identification and removal of outliers followed a multi-step process. First, any known 

outliers were removed based on industry standards or missing data. These filters were 

discussed on page 12 and drop many of the “impossible” values which included transactions 

with average live weight less than 800 lbs or greater than 2,000 lbs, average dressing 

percentage less than 50% or greater than 70%, and live price less than $30/cwt or dressed price 

less than $40/cwt. Second, any known special circumstances were identified and removed from 

the data. For example, when a plant breakdown occurred and cattle were transferred to 

another plant the transfer got recorded as a “new” transaction in the system. USDA AMS 

removes these transactions for reporting purposes. Other cases where USDA AMS would have 

corrected transactions or removed them for reporting purposes occur when there are cattle 

quality issues, a "fat finger" input of the data, and where a transaction was for dairy-bred fed 

cattle but recorded as a beef-type transaction, among others. 

Beyond these identifiable reasons, a statistical approach was used to identify and remove 

additional outliers in the data.8 This was done because when looking at multivariate outliers, it 

becomes difficult to identify the reasons, but known outliers exist and could induce significant 

issues. This is especially the case, for our analysis, as live prices were converted to a dressed 

basis using the estimated dressing percentage for each transaction as reported in the LMR data 

base by reporting packers. Similar to the confidentiality guideline market reporting analyses we 

also combine transactions that include Steers, Heifers, and Mixed Steers/Heifers, and 0-14 day 

and 15-30 day delivery window transactions that were either delivered or FOB. All prices were 

converted to weekly weighted averages (dressed weight basis) for statistical analyses.

The most common method to detect outliers, under the condition the data follow a normal

distribution, is to use a criterion based on z-scores. We take a conservative approach under this 

criterion because of the highly individualized and somewhat idiosyncratic nature of fed cattle 

transactions data. Outlier detection and elimination was done separately on six categorizations 

of transactions. Namely, 1) dressed heifers, 2) live heifers, 3) dressed steers, 4) live steers, 5) 

dressed mixed steers/heifers, and 6) live mixed steers/heifers. We eliminate from our analysis 

only those transactions that are +/- three standard deviations away from the sample mean for 

dressed price (for dressed transactions), live price (for live transactions), and dressing percent 

(for all transactions). Values that occur only in 0.13% of all cases is conservative as other 

research9 suggests being less demanding, and using 2.5 or even 2 standard deviations around 

the mean. This process removed 1,690 transactions or 0.85% of the data.10

 8 This process is consistent with AMS’s data validation process. Following submission, information received from 

packers is automatically screened by the LMR electronic reporting program. Based on established criteria, certain 

transactions are flagged automatically by the program to be excluded during the generation of market reports.

9 Miller, J. 1991. Reaction time analysis with outlier exclusion: Bias varies with sample size. The Quarterly Journal of 

Experimental Psychology 43(4): 907-912. 

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/14640749108400962?needAccess=true

10 An alternative approach was also considered. We performed various influential diagnostic tests (e.g., 

studentized residuals, DFFITS statistics, and DFBETA statistics) and highlighted specific results that may be 

impacted by outlier data. This process identified 10,750 transactions or 5.43% of the data. If a transaction was 
40 | Page

Table 6 reports summary statistics for weighted-average dressed prices by region and 

alignment, and t-tests of mean differences in prices. Paired t-tests are used because the price 

comparisons by alignment are not independent, a natural pairing of the price series exist as the 

base region is always contained in the alternative alignment. The paired t-test is more 

appropriate than a simple test of means because it takes correlation into account. Using this 

correlation results in higher power to detect existing differences between the means.

Findings for price differentials across alignments within regions are mixed, as some alternative 

alignments have higher values and others have lower values, while some show no statistical 

differences compared to the base alignment. For example, within Region 1 there is no statistical 

difference in mean price for IA/MN and IA/MN/SD/IL. However, between IA/MN and 

IA/MN/IL/IN/OH the difference is $0.14/cwt with the IA/MN/IL/IN/OH alignment having lower 

prices than IA/MN on average over the five-year period. 

For Region 2, combining CO and WY with NE increases the price mean by $0.06/cwt, while 

adding SD, CO/WY/SD, or SD/WY to NE decreases the mean price by $0.15/cwt, $0.09/cwt, and 

$0.12/cwt, respectively. When TX/OK/NM is added to KS in Region 3 the mean price is 

$0.23/cwt lower. The addition of CO and WY to KS increases the mean price by $0.28/cwt. The 

one possible realignment to Region 4 is adding CO to TX/OK/NM and leads to a $1.04/cwt 

higher mean price. Adding WY and SD to CO in Region 5, decreases the mean price by

$0.78/cwt. However, when just WY is added to CO the mean price increases by $0.19/cwt.

Mean differences in prices, and paired t-tests, between the base alignment and the 5-Area and 

the National composites are also shown to provide perspective on how further aggregation 

impacts price means. For example, both 5-Area and National mean prices are higher than those 

in IA/MN by $0.70/cwt and $0.60/cwt, respectively. On the other hand, 5-Area and National 

prices are lower than those in NE by $0.61/cwt and $0.71/cwt, respectively. Both the 5-Area 

and National mean price is not statistically different than the KS mean price. TX/OK/NM has a 

lower mean price than the 5-Area and National composites, while CO has a higher mean price 

with price differences in both TX/OK/NM and CO compared to the 5-Area and National 

composites greater than $1/cwt (in absolute value). In general, alternative alignments have less 

impact on mean price levels than aggregation to a 5-Area or National level. Table 6 also shows 

Pearson correlation coefficients between each alternative alignment and the base alignment in 

each region. All correlations are statistically significant at the 99% level of confidence. In fact, 

nearly perfectly positively correlated (values almost equal to 1). Since each base alignment in 

each region represents the bulk of the negotiated trade, this level of correlation was expected.

A measure of spread, or dispersion, was used to describe the variability in prices by alignment 

within a region. We use this in conjunction with a measure of central tendency, the mean, to 

provide a description of this variability. The measure of spread gives us an idea of how well the 

 

removed, using the criterion of three standard deviations away from the mean as opposed to influential diagnostic 

tests, it was more likely an outlier than a valid observation.
41 | Page

mean represents the data. If the spread is large, the mean is not as representative as if the 

spread of data is small. This is because a large spread indicates that there are probably large 

differences between individual transaction prices. Additionally, it is often seen as positive if 

there is little variation in each price series as it indicates that they are similar.

Lower and upper percentiles provide a robust estimator of spread. A percentile range between 

the 15th percentile and the 85th percentile for each base and alternative alignment price series 

is used. Using this spread we know that price p < P15 15% of the time, and, p < P85 85% of the 

time. That is price p is within the range of {P15 − P85} 70% of the time. This range is then divided 

by the weighted average price for each price series and multiplied by 100 to convert it to a 

percentage.

Table 7 reports the price spreads by region and alignment, and paired t-tests of mean 

differences in spreads. For Regions 1, 3, and 4 results reveal statistically larger spreads for 

alternative alignments relative to the base alignment in each region. The one exception is in 

Region 3 where this is no statistical difference between the spread of KS and KS/TX/OK/NM. For 

Region 2 there is no statistical difference between the NE and NE/SD/WY spread, while the 

NE/CO/WY and NE/CO/WY/SD spreads are higher and the NE/SD spread is lower compared to 

the NE spread. For Region 5, all of the alternative alignment spreads are lower than the base 

alignment CO spread. However, the difference in the spread between CO/WY and CO is not 

statistically different than zero.

Table 8 illustrates the percentage change in mean prices of alternative alignments compared to 

the base alignment in each region. For example, in Region 1 a change in mean price is 

calculated as: ((IA/MN/SD/IL weighted average dressed price − IA/MN weighted average 

dressed price) ÷ IA/MN weighted average dressed price) × 100. The table also illustrates the 

percentage of weeks the mean price change falls in the intervals less than -1.0%, -0.51% to -

1.0%, -0.01% to -0.50%, 0.0% to 0.49%, 0.50% to 0.99%, 1.0% to 1.49%, 1.50% to 1.99%, and 

greater than 2.0%.

Comparing alternative alignment IA/MN/SD/IL to base alignment IA/MN shows that 99.2% of 

the time during the 2014-2018 period the percentage change in mean price was in the interval -

0.50% to 0.49%. This means that 258 out of 260 weeks the percentage change in mean price 

was within this range. The comparison of IA/MN/IL/IN/OH and IA/MN was similar at 98.5% or 

256 out of 260 weeks. For all alternative alignments compared to the base NE alignment in 

Region 2, over 99% of the percentage change in mean price was within -0.50% to 0.49%, or 258 

or 259 weeks. For Region 3, 98.5% and 92.7% of the percentage change in mean price was 

within -0.50% to 0.49%, respectively, for the KS/TX/OK/NM to KS and KS/CO/WY to KS 

comparisons.

For alternative alignments compared to the base alignment in Regions 4 and 5 are where 

percentage changes in mean prices become much larger. For Region 4, only 53.9% of the time, 

or 139 out of 258 weeks was the percentage change in mean price from TX/OK/NM to 

TX/OK/NM/CO in the -0.50% to 0.49% range. For Region 5, 51.2% and 86.6% of the percentage 
42 | Page

change in mean price was within -0.50% to 0.49%, respectively, for the CO/WY/SD to CO and 

CO/WY to CO comparisons. Similar to what is shown in Table 6, potential alternative alignments 

have less impact on the percentage change in mean price than aggregation to a 5-Area or 

National level.

Table 9 is an extension of Table 7 and reports the percentage of weeks the {P15 − P85}/PMean

spread falls in the range 0.0% to greater than 7.0% by 1.0% intervals. We consider the 

percentage of weeks that the price spread, as a percent of the mean, for each base alignment is 

between 0% and 2.99%. This shows that for IA/MN, 90.8% of the variation in prices is within 

2.99% of the mean. This is 236 out of 260 weeks. This same measurement for NE, KS, 

TX/OK/NM, and CO is 88.1%, 95.8%, 93.0%, and 76.8%, respectively. As expected, in general 

variability in prices increases (a lower percentage is within 2.99% of the mean) as additional

states are added to make up potential alternative alignments. However, there are a few 

exceptions. If SD is added to NE, 89.2% (compared to 88.1%) of the variation in prices is within 

2.99% of the mean. When WY and SD are combined with CO or when just WY is combined with 

CO, 81.5% (compared to 76.8%) or 79.6% (compared to 76.8%) of the variation in prices is

within 2.99% of the mean.

Considering all alternative market regional alignments, relative specifically to price means and 

variability, several generalizations surface. Combining SD and IL with IA/MN did not change the 

mean price level and only had a small impact on price variability. While combining WY and SD 

with CO did lead to a lower mean price and combining WY with CO led to a higher mean price, 

in both cases price variability was decreased. Similarly, adding SD to NE or SD and WY to NE 

decreased the mean price but also decreased price variability. Further detailed statistical 

analyses of the transaction prices and cattle quality information is completed in an Appendix to 

this report.
43 | Page

Table 6. Summary Statistics for Weighted Average Dressed Price by Region and Alignment, 2014-2018

Mean Correlation

Alignment State(s) N Mean Std Dev Min Max Difference1 Pr > |t| Coefficient Pr > |t|

Region 1

1 IA/MN 260 208.441 30.32 152.78 269.70

2 IA/MN/SD/IL 260 208.435 30.31 153.10 269.64 -0.0055 0.7210 0.99997 <0.0001

3 thru 10 IA/MN/IL/IN/OH 260 208.297 30.26 153.03 269.46 -0.1440 <0.0001 0.99995 <0.0001

11 5 Area 260 209.143 30.24 154.48 270.87 0.7023 <0.0001 0.99911 <0.0001

12 National 260 209.044 30.23 154.46 270.65 0.6037 <0.0001 0.99922 <0.0001

Region 2

1, 3, 5 NE 260 209.751 30.42 155.59 270.96

2 NE/CO/WY 260 209.810 30.43 155.48 271.58 0.0591 <0.0001 0.99997 <0.0001

4, 6, 8 NE/SD 260 209.598 30.45 155.35 270.90 -0.1530 <0.0001 0.99998 <0.0001

7, 10 NE/CO/WY/SD 260 209.663 30.45 155.27 271.32 -0.0880 <0.0001 0.99997 <0.0001

9 NE/SD/WY 260 209.634 30.45 155.35 270.97 -0.1174 <0.0001 0.99998 <0.0001

11 5 Area 260 209.143 30.24 154.48 270.87 -0.6085 <0.0001 0.99977 <0.0001

12 National 260 209.044 30.23 154.46 270.65 -0.7071 <0.0001 0.99977 <0.0001

Region 3

1, 3, 4, 7, 9 KS 260 209.134 30.06 154.50 273.20

2, 5, 6, 10 KS/TX/OK/NM 260 208.908 30.07 154.38 272.93 -0.2265 <0.0001 0.99996 <0.0001

8 KS/CO/WY 260 209.412 30.17 154.48 274.03 0.2778 <0.0001 0.99986 <0.0001

11 5 Area 260 209.143 30.24 154.48 270.87 0.0084 0.9411 0.99816 <0.0001

12 National 260 209.044 30.23 154.46 270.65 -0.0902 0.4475 0.99801 <0.0001

Region 4

1 thru 8, 10 TX/OK/NM 258 207.774 29.83 154.02 272.12

9 TX/OK/NM/CO 260 209.018 30.34 154.10 275.66 1.0411 <0.0001 0.99915 <0.0001

11 5 Area 260 209.143 30.24 154.48 270.87 1.1856 <0.0001 0.99759 <0.0001

12 National 260 209.044 30.23 154.46 270.65 1.0870 <0.0001 0.99744 <0.0001

Region 5

1, 2, 7 thru 10 CO 254 210.739 30.83 154.24 275.93

3, 5 CO/WY/SD 260 209.404 30.60 154.16 272.80 -0.7787 <0.0001 0.99836 <0.0001

4, 6 CO/WY 260 210.388 30.71 154.40 276.15 0.1898 <0.0001 0.99973 <0.0001

11 5 Area 260 209.143 30.24 154.48 270.87 -1.0585 <0.0001 0.99788 <0.0001

12 National 260 209.044 30.23 154.46 270.65 -1.1553 <0.0001 0.99779 <0.0001 1 The paired t-test only use cases that have non-missing values for both variables. As such the mean differences for Regions 4 and 5 are different than would be 

calculated using the summary statistic means.
44 | Page

Table 7. Summary Statistics for Price Spreads as Percent of Mean Price by Region and Alignment, 2014-2018

Mean

Alignment State(s) N Mean Std Dev Min Max Difference1 Pr > |t|

Region 1

1 IA/MN 260 1.966 0.85 0.78 6.92

2 IA/MN/SD/IL 260 2.090 0.85 0.80 6.93 0.1241 <0.0001

3 thru 10 IA/MN/IL/IN/OH 260 2.281 0.88 0.94 6.92 0.3154 <0.0001

11 5 Area 260 2.358 0.86 1.00 6.62 0.3929 <0.0001

12 National 260 2.485 0.85 1.10 6.31 0.5195 <0.0001

Region 2

1, 3, 5 NE 260 1.906 0.90 0.00 5.34

2 NE/CO/WY 260 2.059 0.91 0.47 5.49 0.1533 <0.0001

4, 6, 8 NE/SD 260 1.855 0.87 0.32 5.34 -0.0506 0.0003

7, 10 NE/CO/WY/SD 260 1.996 0.89 0.50 5.33 0.0899 <0.0001

9 NE/SD/WY 260 1.887 0.88 0.47 5.34 -0.0185 0.1786

11 5 Area 260 2.358 0.86 1.00 6.62 0.4525 <0.0001

12 National 260 2.485 0.85 1.10 6.31 0.5792 <0.0001

Region 3

1, 3, 4, 7, 9 KS 260 1.936 0.71 0.79 6.13

2, 5, 6, 10 KS/TX/OK/NM 260 1.951 0.59 0.93 4.74 0.0153 0.4641

8 KS/CO/WY 260 2.137 0.69 1.10 6.57 0.2006 <0.0001

11 5 Area 260 2.358 0.86 1.00 6.62 0.4224 <0.0001

12 National 260 2.485 0.85 1.10 6.31 0.5491 <0.0001

Region 4

1 thru 8, 10 TX/OK/NM 258 1.740 0.77 0.00 4.81

9 TX/OK/NM/CO 260 2.452 0.97 0.32 6.70 0.7137 <0.0001

11 5 Area 260 2.358 0.86 1.00 6.62 0.6172 <0.0001

12 National 260 2.485 0.85 1.10 6.31 0.7460 <0.0001

Region 5

1, 2, 7 thru 10 CO 254 2.508 1.37 0.06 9.11

3, 5 CO/WY/SD 260 2.219 1.02 0.42 8.03 -0.2796 0.0004

4, 6 CO/WY 260 2.451 1.16 0.00 8.01 -0.0148 0.7596

11 5 Area 260 2.358 0.86 1.00 6.62 -0.1489 0.0936

12 National 260 2.485 0.85 1.10 6.31 -0.0250 0.7789 1 The paired t-test only use cases that have non-missing values for both variables. As such the mean differences for 

Regions 4 and 5 are different than would be calculated using the summary statistic means.
45 | Page

Table 8. Change in Mean Price as Percentage of Base Mean by Region and Alignment, 2014-2018

-0.51 to -0.01 to 0.00 to 0.50 to 1.00 to 1.50 to

Alignment State(s) N Mean Std Dev Min Max < -1.00 -1.00 -0.50 0.49 0.99 1.49 1.99 >= 2.00

Region 1 (Base = IA/MN vs. Alternative Alignment)

2 IA/MN/SD/IL 260 -0.002 0.13 -0.61 0.66 0.0% 0.4% 50.4% 48.8% 0.4% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

3 thru 10 IA/MN/IL/IN/OH 260 -0.065 0.17 -0.52 1.65 0.0% 0.4% 80.4% 18.1% 0.4% 0.4% 0.4% 0.0%

11 5 Area 260 0.353 0.65 -1.38 2.45 1.9% 6.5% 20.4% 38.1% 15.8% 11.5% 5.0% 0.8%

12 National 260 0.306 0.61 -1.32 2.25 1.5% 5.8% 21.9% 41.2% 16.5% 8.8% 3.8% 0.4%

Region 2 (Base = NE vs. Alternative Alignment)

2 NE/CO/WY 260 0.028 0.12 -0.65 0.55 0.0% 0.4% 39.6% 59.6% 0.4% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

4, 6, 8 NE/SD 260 -0.077 0.10 -0.55 0.11 0.0% 0.4% 80.4% 19.2% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

7, 10 NE/CO/WY/SD 260 -0.045 0.12 -0.72 0.40 0.0% 0.4% 65.4% 34.2% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

9 NE/SD/WY 260 -0.060 0.10 -0.51 0.16 0.0% 0.4% 74.2% 25.4% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

11 5 Area 260 -0.284 0.32 -1.67 0.87 1.9% 20.8% 63.8% 12.7% 0.8% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

12 National 260 -0.331 0.32 -1.61 0.75 2.3% 23.8% 60.8% 12.3% 0.8% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

Region 3 (Base = KS vs. Alternative Alignment)

2, 5, 6, 10 KS/TX/OK/NM 260 -0.111 0.13 -0.71 0.54 0.0% 1.2% 84.6% 13.8% 0.4% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

8 KS/CO/WY 260 0.128 0.24 -0.78 0.97 0.0% 1.5% 24.2% 68.5% 5.8% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

11 5 Area 260 -0.007 0.85 -2.87 2.87 11.9% 15.8% 19.6% 26.5% 16.5% 6.9% 1.5% 1.2%

12 National 260 -0.054 0.89 -3.07 2.76 15.4% 15.0% 17.3% 26.5% 16.5% 6.9% 1.2% 1.2%

Region 4 (Base = TX/OK/NM vs. Alternative Alignment)

9 TX/OK/NM/CO 258 0.479 0.60 -1.25 2.53 1.6% 2.7% 11.2% 42.6% 25.6% 10.1% 4.7% 1.6%

11 5 Area 258 0.555 0.98 -2.20 3.55 5.4% 7.4% 14.0% 20.9% 20.2% 15.9% 10.1% 6.2%

12 National 258 0.508 1.01 -2.40 3.50 7.0% 9.7% 13.2% 19.4% 20.5% 14.0% 10.1% 6.2%

Region 5 (Base = CO vs. Alternative Alignment)

3, 5 CO/WY/SD 254 -0.368 0.83 -3.46 1.59 18.9% 18.9% 28.0% 23.2% 7.9% 2.4% 0.8% 0.0%

4, 6 CO/WY 254 0.091 0.33 -1.02 1.61 0.4% 5.1% 24.0% 62.6% 6.3% 0.8% 0.8% 0.0%

11 5 Area 254 -0.479 0.95 -3.43 2.85 26.4% 21.3% 22.0% 17.7% 8.7% 1.6% 1.2% 1.2%

12 National 254 -0.525 0.97 -3.48 2.91 29.9% 21.7% 19.3% 16.9% 7.9% 2.0% 1.2% 1.2%
46 | Page

Table 9. Price Spreads as Percentage of Mean by Region and Alignment, 2014-2018

0.00 to 1.00 to 2.00 to 3.00 to 4.00 to 5.00 to 6.00 to

Alignment State(s) N Mean Std Dev Min Max 0.99 1.99 2.99 3.99 4.99 5.99 6.99 >= 7.00

Region 1

1 IA/MN 260 1.966 0.85 0.78 6.92 3.8% 61.2% 25.8% 5.8% 2.3% 0.4% 0.8% 0.0%

2 IA/MN/SD/IL 260 2.090 0.85 0.80 6.93 0.4% 58.1% 31.5% 6.2% 2.7% 0.0% 1.2% 0.0%

3 thru 10 IA/MN/IL/IN/OH 260 2.281 0.88 0.94 6.92 0.4% 47.3% 36.2% 11.9% 2.7% 0.4% 1.2% 0.0%

11 5 Area 260 2.358 0.86 1.00 6.62 0.0% 40.4% 41.9% 12.7% 3.5% 1.2% 0.4% 0.0%

12 National 260 2.485 0.85 1.10 6.31 0.0% 32.3% 46.2% 15.0% 5.0% 1.2% 0.4% 0.0%

Region 2

1 NE 260 1.906 0.90 0.00 5.34 10.4% 52.7% 25.0% 7.7% 3.5% 0.8% 0.0% 0.0%

2 NE/CO/WY 260 2.059 0.91 0.47 5.49 5.4% 50.4% 30.0% 9.2% 3.5% 1.5% 0.0% 0.0%

4, 6, 8 NE/SD 260 1.855 0.87 0.32 5.34 11.5% 53.5% 24.2% 7.3% 3.1% 0.4% 0.0% 0.0%

7, 10 NE/CO/WY/SD 260 1.996 0.89 0.50 5.33 6.2% 55.0% 26.2% 8.1% 3.5% 1.2% 0.0% 0.0%

9 NE/SD/WY 260 1.887 0.88 0.47 5.34 8.8% 55.4% 24.6% 7.3% 3.1% 0.8% 0.0% 0.0%

11 5 Area 260 2.358 0.86 1.00 6.62 0.0% 40.4% 41.9% 12.7% 3.5% 1.2% 0.4% 0.0%

12 National 260 2.485 0.85 1.10 6.31 0.0% 32.3% 46.2% 15.0% 5.0% 1.2% 0.4% 0.0%

Region 3

1 KS 260 1.936 0.71 0.79 6.13 2.3% 61.9% 31.5% 2.3% 0.8% 0.8% 0.4% 0.0%

2, 5, 6, 10 KS/TX/OK/NM 260 1.951 0.59 0.93 4.74 1.5% 62.3% 31.2% 3.5% 1.5% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

8 KS/CO/WY 260 2.137 0.69 1.10 6.57 0.0% 47.7% 45.8% 5.0% 0.4% 0.8% 0.4% 0.0%

11 5 Area 260 2.358 0.86 1.00 6.62 0.0% 40.4% 41.9% 12.7% 3.5% 1.2% 0.4% 0.0%

12 National 260 2.485 0.85 1.10 6.31 0.0% 32.3% 46.2% 15.0% 5.0% 1.2% 0.4% 0.0%

Region 4

1 TX/OK/NN 258 1.740 0.77 0.00 4.81 14.3% 58.9% 19.8% 4.3% 2.7% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

9 TX/OK/NM/CO 260 2.452 0.97 0.32 6.70 2.3% 33.1% 40.4% 16.9% 5.0% 1.5% 0.8% 0.0%

11 5 Area 260 2.358 0.86 1.00 6.62 0.0% 40.4% 41.9% 12.7% 3.5% 1.2% 0.4% 0.0%

12 National 260 2.485 0.85 1.10 6.31 0.0% 32.3% 46.2% 15.0% 5.0% 1.2% 0.4% 0.0%

Region 5

1 CO 254 2.508 1.37 0.06 9.11 5.9% 31.5% 39.4% 12.6% 5.1% 1.6% 1.2% 2.8%

3, 5 CO/WY/SD 260 2.219 1.02 0.42 8.03 2.7% 47.3% 31.5% 13.1% 2.7% 1.9% 0.4% 0.4%

4, 6 CO/WY 260 2.451 1.16 0.00 8.01 5.0% 30.8% 43.8% 12.7% 3.5% 2.3% 1.2% 0.8%

11 5 Area 260 2.358 0.86 1.00 6.62 0.0% 40.4% 41.9% 12.7% 3.5% 1.2% 0.4% 0.0%

12 National 260 2.485 0.85 1.10 6.31 0.0% 32.3% 46.2% 15.0% 5.0% 1.2% 0.4% 0.0%
47 | Page

Hedonic Modeling To further assess alternative alignments of various states in regional market information 

reporting, we estimated a hedonic model of transaction prices. The hedonic model serves 

several purposes. First, it enables us to assess differences in typical prices across candidate 

states to combine, after adjusting for other relevant transaction characteristics as available in 

LMR data. As such, the hedonic model provides an additional guide to selecting potential states 

to combine in regional price reporting. Second, the hedonic modeling provides information on 

how transaction characteristics typically influence price differentials across transactions which 

helps illustrate sensitivity of prices to transaction attributes. The more sensitive prices are to 

varying transaction attributes, the more market reports might want to assess disaggregating 

price reports by attributes. Or to put it another way, the less sensitive prices are to various 

transaction attributes, the more comfort there is in aggregating data across transactions to 

reduce confidentiality constraints. Third, not only does the hedonic model provide an aggregate 

test of statistical significance and interpretation of economic relevance of various price 

determinants, it also provides a direct assessment of how reliable or systematic each attribute 

is in impacting price differentials across transactions.

The hedonic model was formulated using each transaction price (live converted to dressed) as 

the dependent variable. Only negotiated transactions included in the 13 states considered in 

previous analysis in this study were included in the hedonic modeling. The individual 

transaction (i) prices across all days over the 2014-18 period in an unbalanced panel were 

regressed against the characteristics of the transacted set of cattle including:

Dependent Variable:

Pricei the dressed price paid per hundred weight for each transaction i.

Independent Variables:

STATEi binary variables for the state of origin of the cattle (where STATE=IA, MN, IL, IN, 

OH, CO, WY, SD, TX, NM, OK, KS, or NE),

DRESSWTi and DRESSWTSQi dressed weight (lbs. per head) and dress weight squared to 

allow for nonlinearity in price as weight changes,

STEERi, HEIFERi, MIXEDi binary variables for purchase class,

DRESSEDi binary variable for whether the transaction was purchased on a dressed basis 

as opposed to a live basis

DELIVEREDi binary variable for whether the transaction was delivered to the plant as 

opposed to FOB,

0to14DAYi binary variable for whether the transaction was a 0-14 day delivery as

opposed to 15-30 day,

0to14DAYyri (where yr = 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, or 2018) binary variables, to allow the 

0-14 day delivery price differential to vary by year the 0-14 Day variable was 

interacted with a set of binary year variables,

HEADi and HEADSQi number of head included in the transaction and number of head 

squared to allow for nonlinearity,
48 | Page

CHOICEi the estimated percent Choice quality grade cattle in the transaction,

DAYi daily dummy variables were included to account for aggregate change in market 

price over time.

The full model is:

PPPPPPPPPPii = ββ0 + ∑ ββssSSSSSSSSSSss + SS

ss=1 ββSS+1DDRR RR ii + ββSS+2DDRR RR RRii + ββSS+3SSSSSSSS ii

+ ββSS+4HHHH HH RRii + ββSS+5MM MM ii + ββSS+6DD DDii + ββSS+7DD DD DD DDii

+ ββSS+80tttt14DD DDii + ββSS+90tttt14DD DD2014ii + ββSS+100tttt14DD DD2015ii

+ ββSS+110tttt14DD DD2016ii + ββSS+120tttt14DD DD2017ii

+ ββSS+13HH ii + ββSS+14HH ii + ββSS+15CC CC CC ii + ∑ δδddDD DDdd + DD

dd=1 Eii

In estimation, the state of NE, and STEER were the defaults and dropped to avoid perfect 

collinearity and the 0to14DAY2018 variable was dropped since it was embedded in the 

0to14DAY variable. The model was also estimated dropping the intercept term and not 

dropping a DAY. Three alternative models were estimated to illustrate potential model 

sensitivity to inclusion of specific independent variables. The percentage Choice grade variable 

had an unexpected negative sign in Model 1, so it was dropped in Model 2 to investigate its 

impact on other coefficients. The number of head and head squared were also dropped in 

Model 3 to assess how this variable impacted state price differences. The rationale was because 

some states tend to have smaller transaction sizes, the binary state variables could be 

associated with the number of head per transaction. 

The estimates from the hedonic models are presented in Table 10. From a general perspective, 

key conclusions are the same for the main variables of interest across all three models. That is, 

dropping HEAD, HEADSQ, and CHOICE had no discernable economically or statistically 

important impact on the coefficient estimates for the rest of the variables in the models. As 

such, discussion here will focus on Model 1 that includes these variables since it is the most 

general model, results are essentially the same across the other model variants. With the large 

number of observations of nearly 200,000 transactions, nearly all variables are statistically 

significantly different from zero with at least a 99% level of confidence. Only two variables were 

not significant at these high levels. They included the NM price differential relative to the 

default of NE (but NM has very few transactions over the time period – only 27 (Table 2), so this 

is not a noteworthy result). The second variable not statistically significant at 99% confidence 

levels is the 0to14DAY2017 variable which simply measures whether the 0to14DAY delivery in 

2017 had a statistically different price impact than the default or base year of 2018. So, this 

result simply indicates 2017 and 2018 had similar price differentials associated with 1 to 14 

relative to 15-30 day delivery transactions.
49 | Page

Dependent Coefficient Standard Coefficient Standard Coefficient Standard

Variable Estimate Error P-Value Estimate Error P-Value Estimate Error P-Value

NE base base base

IA -0.959 0.021 <.0001 -1.024 0.020 <.0001 -1.085 0.020 <.0001

MN -1.899 0.040 <.0001 -1.966 0.039 <.0001 -1.986 0.039 <.0001

IL -1.848 0.037 <.0001 -1.949 0.036 <.0001 -2.097 0.036 <.0001

IN -2.177 0.071 <.0001 -2.305 0.070 <.0001 -2.476 0.070 <.0001

OH -1.260 0.069 <.0001 -1.365 0.068 <.0001 -1.534 0.068 <.0001

CO 0.358 0.045 <.0001 0.423 0.045 <.0001 0.419 0.045 <.0001

WY 1.638 0.085 <.0001 1.639 0.085 <.0001 1.677 0.085 <.0001

SD -0.719 0.030 <.0001 -0.760 0.030 <.0001 -0.782 0.030 <.0001

TX -1.654 0.042 <.0001 -1.452 0.040 <.0001 -1.499 0.040 <.0001

NM -0.855 0.629 0.1739 -0.773 0.629 0.2191 -0.888 0.630 0.1584

OK -1.976 0.083 <.0001 -1.862 0.082 <.0001 -1.961 0.082 <.0001

KS -0.593 0.026 <.0001 -0.481 0.025 <.0001 -0.540 0.025 <.0001

DRESSWT 0.088 0.002 <.0001 0.087 0.002 <.0001 0.085 0.002 <.0001

DRESSWTSQ -0.000053 0.000001 <.0001 -0.000054 0.000001 <.0001 -0.000052 0.000001 <.0001

STEER base base base

HEIFER -0.260 0.022 <.0001 -0.324 0.021 <.0001 -0.317 0.021 <.0001

MIXED -0.443 0.020 <.0001 -0.469 0.020 <.0001 -0.505 0.020 <.0001

DRESSED -0.181 0.028 <.0001 -0.168 0.028 <.0001 -0.201 0.028 <.0001

DELIVERED 0.915 0.028 <.0001 0.923 0.028 <.0001 0.886 0.028 <.0001

0to14DAY 1.258 0.043 <.0001 1.244 0.043 <.0001 1.219 0.043 <.0001

0to14DAY2014 -0.227 0.069 0.0009 -0.206 0.069 0.0026 -0.219 0.069 0.0015

0to14DAY2015 0.122 0.070 0.0808 0.151 0.070 0.0308 0.163 0.070 0.0201

0to14DAY2016 0.173 0.066 0.0088 0.178 0.066 0.0071 0.185 0.066 0.0053

0to14DAY2017 0.078 0.063 0.2126 0.074 0.063 0.2389 0.071 0.063 0.261

HEAD 0.0017 0.000 <.0001 0.0018 0.000 <.0001 - - -

HEADSQ -0.00000045 0.000 <.0001 -0.00000047 0.000 <.0001 - - -

CHOICE -0.012 0.001 <.0001 - - - - - -

DAY

R-Squared 0.9998 0.9998 0.9998

RMSE 3.064 3.066 3.070

Observations 190,351 190,351 190,351

daily dummy variables too numerous to report

Table 10. Hedonic Model Parameter Estimates Using Transaction from 13 Select States

Model 1 Model 2 Model 3

A few key takeaways from the hedonic model are important for this study. First, the STATE 

coefficient estimates provide a summary of how, after adjusting for other cofactors included in 

the model, state prices compare. To better illustrate these coefficients, they are graphed in 

Figure 9. Recall, NE is the base state, so all other coefficients represent price in that state 

relative to NE. For example, IA has a -0.96 coefficient which simply implies, all else held 

constant, IA had a $0.96/cwt dressed basis lower price than NE. We can also compare other 

states with each other in this chart. For example, MN has a coefficient estimate of -1.90 and IA

of -0.96, this implies MN had a price that is on average $0.94 (-1.90 – -0.96) lower than IA. The 

chart suggests grouping for example WY (+1.64) with OK (-1.98) transactions would be 

combining markets with quite different price levels. This is not something we would necessarily 

recommend in regional price reporting as it would mask economically important regional price 
50 | Page

differences. Similarly, the hedonic models suggest SD has price patterns more consistent with 

IA and NE than CO and particularly WY. 

 

F-tests were conducted for each model on subsets of state coefficients that are of specific 

interest to compare since they are part of possible market alignments presented earlier. With 

such large numbers of observations present in the data set, we expect the F-tests to result in 

statistical differences being present across state variable estimated coefficients. We report the 

F-tests for comparing specific state coefficients in Table 11. As expected, essentially all of the Ftests suggest the individual state coefficients are not statistically equal to each other at high 

levels of statistical confidence. This means combining transactions from these markets results 

in calculated weighted-average prices that are blends of markets with statistically different 

price levels. More important than the statistical significance however are economic differences 

across specific state estimated coefficients. One can make the case from Figure 9 that MN, IN, 

IL, and OH could be combined perhaps with IA. One could also justify combining TX, OK, and 

NM from these results. What to do with SD requires more assessment combining this particular

segment of the analysis with the other assessments in this study which we did earlier in this 

report. 

$0.00

-$0.96

-$1.90 -$1.85

-$2.18

-$1.26

$0.36

$1.64

-$0.72

-$1.65

-$0.85

-$1.98

-$0.59

-$2.50

-$2.00

-$1.50

-$1.00

-$0.50

$0.00

$0.50

$1.00

$1.50

$2.00

$2.50

NE IA MN IL IN OH CO WY SD TX NM OK KS

Price Differential ($/cwt carcass basis)

State

Figure 9. State of Origin Price Differentials Relative to NE Estimated using 

Hedonic Model 1
51 | Page

Testing

Statistical Model 1 Model 2 Model 3

Equality F-Value P-Value F-Value P-Value F-Value P-Value

IA 561 <.0001 514 <.0001 <.0001

MN

IA 306 <.0001 356 <.0001 325 <.0001

MN

IL

IN

OH

CO 187 <.0001 180 <.0001 169 <.0001

WY

TX 7.7 0.0005 14.6 <.0001 11.8 <.0001

NM

OK

TX 318 <.0001 283 <.0001 284 <.0001

NM

OK

KS

Table 11. F-Test Results Statistcally Comparing Sets of State Coefficients 

from Hedonic Models

Of additional interest for this study is how similar the 0-14 day delivery window transactions 

are compared to the 15-30 day. Figure 10 illustrates the price differentials associated with 0-14 

day deliveries based on the hedonic model estimates. The price differentials were allowed to 

vary by year in the estimation of the model. The reason for allowing these to vary by year is 

because in a forward up trending market, we might expect 0-14 day prices to be lower than 15-

30 and the reverse when forward prices are trending down. However, the 0-14 day transactions 

typically were purchased at a premium relative to the 15-30 day over the five-year time period

after adjusting for differences in other attributes associated with the transactions. In 2014 the 

0-14 day transactions were at about a $1/cwt premium, the premium was the highest in 2016 

at $1.43/cwt and it was $1.26/cwt in 2018. Recalling aggregate 5-Area market price trends 

summarized in Figure 2 we might have expected 15-30 day to be at a premium to 0-14 day in 

2014 since the market trended upward during most of that year. In contrast, the market 

trended downward quite rapidly in both 2015 and 2016 suggesting the largest premiums for 0-

14 day deliveries during that time. The premium for 0-14 was indeed larger during 2015 and 

2016 than other years, but 0-14 still had a premium in 2014, though it was the smallest of the 

five years. 
52 | Page

To help further assess how prices between 0-14 and 15-30 delivery trade compare, we graphed

the national weekly weighted-average 0-14 and 15-30 day delivery prices (converted to a 

dressed basis) in Figure 11 (these are estimated from transaction data and not based on 

estimates from the hedonic model) and the 0-14 day minus the 15-30 day price in Figure 12. 

These graphs illustrate first, as we would expect, the 0-14 day and 15-30 day weighted average 

prices track each other closely over time (Figure 11). However, the difference between the 

prices on any given week vary noticeably (Figure 12) with the 0-14 price typically being higher 

by about $1 to $2/cwt, consistent with hedonic model parameter estimates (Figure 10). 

However, the premium for 0-14 varies from a low of about -$2.50/cwt during one week in 2016 

to an extreme spike of nearly a $10/cwt premium during one week in 2017. Transaction prices 

of 0-14 relative to 15-30 day cattle certainly vary more week to week than what is revealed by 

the hedonic model. 

$1.03

$1.38 $1.43

$1.34

$1.26

$0.00

$0.20

$0.40

$0.60

$0.80

$1.00

$1.20

$1.40

$1.60

2014 2015 2016 2017 2018

Price Differential ($/cwt carcass basis)

Year

Figure 10. Estimated Premium for 0 to 14 Day Delivery Relative to 15 to 30 

Day Delivery by Year, Model 1
53 | Page

$150

$170

$190

$210

$230

$250

$270

$290

2014 2015 2016 2017 2018

Price ($/cwt carcasss basis)

Date (weeks)

Figure 11. National Weekly Weighted Average Calculated Dressed Price for 

0 to 14 and 15 to 30 Day Delivery, 2014-2018

0 to 14 Day 15 to 30 Day

-$4

-$2

$0

$2

$4

$6

$8

$10

$12

2014 2015 2016 2017 2018

Price Difference ($/cwt carcass basis)

Date (weeks)

Figure 12. Weekly Calculated National Weighted Average Dressed 0 to 14 Day 

minus 15 to 30 Day Delivery Price, 2014-2018 
54 | Page

Other information revealed from the hedonic model in Table 10 is that heifers received a 

$0.26/cwt lower price than steers and transactions with mixed steers and heifers brought about 

$0.44/cwt lower. Dressed transactions had about an $0.18/cwt lower price than live and 

delivered transactions received around $0.91/cwt more than FOB. The CHOICE variable had a 

negative and statistically significant coefficient. This would suggest a greater percentage of 

cattle grading Choice in the transaction resulted in a lower price. However, the coefficient was 

economically small as, for example, a 30 percentage point increase in Choice (e.g., 40% to 70%) 

reduced price by only $0.36/cwt. This suggests this coefficient, though statistically significant, is 

essentially economically irrelevant. We suspect this is because percentage Choice is an estimate 

that may suffer from biases across packers, and as such, may not be highly reliable or often 

used in establishing transaction prices. Since dropping the CHOICE variable in Models 2 and 3 

had no important impact on other coefficient estimates, we did not spend more time on this 

variable.

The final set of coefficients that are reported in the hedonic model are the dressed weight and 

head in linear and quadratic terms. The easiest way to interpret the impacts of these variables 

on price is to graph predicted price as the variables range across relevant levels. Figure 13

shows how price varied with carcass weight. According to this model, the carcass weight with 

the highest price occurred at about 750 to 900 lb carcasses. For carcass weights below 700 lbs 

price dropped with a 600 lb carcass receiving about a $2/cwt lower price than an 800 lb. 

Similarly, as carcass weight increases above 950 lb price began to drop off with a 1050 lb 

carcass bringing about a $2/cwt lower price than an 800 lb. carcass. A similar graph was 

constructed varying the number of head per transaction (Figure 14). The number of head per 

transaction had a relatively small price impact with increasing head from about 15 to 500 head 

increasing price by about $1/cwt and increasing to 1500 head (from 15 head) about $2/cwt 

after which the price basically levels out beyond 1500 head.
55 | Page

$188

$190

$192

$194

$196

$198

$200

$202

500 550 600 650 700 750 800 850 900 950 1000 1050 1100 1150 1200

Prices ($/cwt carcass basis)

Carcass Weight (lbs.)

Figure 13. Illustration of Price Differential Associated with Varying Carcass 

Weight, Model 1

$199

$200

$200

$201

$201

$202

$202

10 250 490 730 970 1210 1450 1690 1930 2170 2410

Price ($/cwt carcass basis)

Head

Figure 14. Illustration of Price Differential Associated with Number of Head 

per Transaction, Model 1 
56 | Page

Recommended Market Alignment Based on confidentiality constraints associated with the market alignments and the statistical 

analyses focused solely on negotiated trade, we propose an alternative preferred regional 

market alignment to the current alignment used by AMS in 5-Area market reports. The market 

alignment we recommend is presented in Table 12 and illustrated in Figure 15. 

Table 12. Recommended Market Alignment for Regional Market Reporting

Region 1 Region 2 Region 3 Region 4 Region 5

IA/MN/SD/IL NE KS TX/OK/NM CO/WY

Figure 15. Recommended Alignment for Regional Market Reporting (Percentages Reported 

are National Negotiated Domestic Head Represented by Region, 2014-18) 

37%

34%

5%

17%

5%
57 | Page

Rationale for Recommended Regions 

The regions were included in the recommended alignment based on the combined assessment 

of all analyses completed. First, supporting the recommended alignment of including 

transactions from SD, IL, and WY with current regional reporting is justified based on the 

volume of negotiated cash trade occurring in these regions. Over the 2014-2018 period, SD had 

the 4th largest negotiated volume at 6.7% (behind NE, IA, and KS), IL represented the 8th largest 

volume at 2%, and WY the 9th largest at 1%. Other possible candidate states to include are OH, 

IN, and WI which all had less than 0.5% of volume represented. With thinning negotiated cash 

trade, the more volume that can be included in market information reports the better as long 

as added volume contributes relevant information to improve the quality of market reporting. 

There is a tradeoff that simply adding states to regional reports is not recommended if the 

markets being combined are not well integrated based on statistical analyses.

Second, the ability of reporting of negotiated cash transactions subject to confidentiality 

analysis completed on the ten alternative alignments conducted reveals the proposed 

alignment is at least as good as any other we considered and allows marginally more frequent 

price reporting especially for the CO/WY region compared to the CO region by itself. Table 13 

summarizes the confidentiality outcomes which were copied from various sections of Table 5

and provided here for convenience.

This alignment offers several improvements relative to current reporting regions in reducing, 

but not eliminating, confidentiality constraints to market information reporting. The key 

changes are in the IA/MN/SD/IL region where under this new alignment, over the entire 2014-

2018 period, reportability of 0-30 and 0-14 day transactions remained at 100%. Reportability of

15-30 day increased from 46% of the weeks for IA/MN to 56% for the IA/MN/SD/IL alignment. 

In CO/WY, reportability increased for both 0-30 day and 0-14 day transactions relative to the 

CO only alignment by six percentage points (87% to 93%) for 0-30 day and by 11 percentage 

points (79% to 90%) for 0-14 day. In CO/WY, separate 15-30 day reporting is still completely 

constrained from being reportable. In general, even this recommended alignment does not 

relieve confidentiality constraints for 15-30 day negotiated cash transactions for most regions.

Further supporting the recommended alignment is the statistical price analysis. Combining SD 

and IL with current IA/MN slightly increased the price variation of price reporting, but by an 

economically very small amount compared to adding other candidate states of IN and OH to 

this alignment. Correlations of hedonic model prediction errors and hedonic price instability 

coefficient differences (discussed in the Appendix) were relatively high for IA, MN, SD, and IL 

supporting combining these states but relatively low for IA with OH and IN further suggesting 

OH and IN are not strong candidate markets to combine with IA/MN. Combining WY with CO is 

also supported by the statistical analysis as the CO/WY market combination demonstrates less 

price variation than present in CO alone and the CO and WY markets appear at least reasonably 

integrated. 
58 | Page

Table 13. Recommended Market Alignment Confidentiality Reportable Trade, 

2014-2018

Region / Delivery Window 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2014-18

% of Weeks Trade Reportable

IA/MN/SD/IL

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 73% 57% 0% 63% 90% 56%

NE

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 36% 43% 18%

CO/WY

0-30 Day 98% 90% 90% 100% 87% 93%

0-14 Day 83% 90% 90% 100% 87% 90%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0%

KS

0-30 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

0-14 Day 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0%

TX/OK/NM

0-30 Day 90% 47% 90% 100% 100% 85%

0-14 Day 85% 40% 90% 100% 100% 83%

15-30 Day 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0%

The challenges associated with negotiated cash price reporting for the TX/OK/NM market 

remain with the recommended alignment and largely also remain with the proposed CO/WY 

market region. We considered combining TX/OK/NM with several other alternative alignments 

including in particular CO and KS, the most logical candidates. The statistical price analysis did 

not support combining the CO market with the TX/OK/NM region in general. While the market 

integration assessment using the hedonic models provided some support for combining these 

states into one reporting region, assessment of price spreads and the hedonic modeling suggest 

CO prices differ from TX/OK/NM in economically important ways. As such, statistical analyses 

do not support combining these markets and this is further justified when CO and WY are 

combined. Combining TX/OK/NM with KS is not strongly recommended since this would have 

virtually no impact on price reporting confidentiality in KS. However, combining these markets 
59 | Page

also appears that it would not substantially deteriorate the quality of price reporting in either 

market region as these markets appear to be integrated. However, TX and OK prices tend to be 

lower than KS which would mean combining them would reduce the combined price reported 

and as such, we elected not to recommend combining these markets at this time for price 

reporting. 

Another potential consideration could be to condense the recommended 5-Area regions we 

propose here into a smaller set of more aggregated alternatives. One could consider numerous 

alternatives here from one extreme of eliminating all regional reports and reporting simply a 

national market report to another extreme of considering adding even more areas. The 

tradeoffs we have emphasized throughout this report associated with aggregating markets and 

reducing information content relative to enabling more frequent reporting conditional on 

maintaining confidentiality must continually be considered. Moreover, it is important to note 

our analysis presumes that LMR data retains current structure such that whole states have to 

be assigned to a sole reporting region as previously noted.

One might consider for example, publishing Northern and Southern regional market reports as 

a compromise to what might ultimately be dropping the CO/WY and the TX/OK/NM market 

region reports. In such an alignment, the states north of KS and CO could be the Northern 

region and the states south of NE and WY the Southern region (of the states shaded in Figure 

15). The tradeoff for this alignment is it would result in a loss in the content of market 

information across both regions due to the level of aggregation. Our analysis suggests this 

information loss is not justified for the Northern regions and our statistical analysis would not

support combining KS with CO, TX/OK/NM markets for price reporting. Little is gained in terms 

of information reporting for such a Southern region for this combination. As such, at this time 

we do not recommend aggregating to Northern and Southern market reports.

Another alternative could be to consider a 3-Area market alignment, rather than a 5-Area, such 

as our previously assessed alignment 2 (see Figure 16 provided below for convenience). This 

alignment has some appeal because it increases the number of states relative to the current 5-

Area report and each area has sufficient negotiated trade to be generally reportable at least for 

0-14 day trade (though 15-30 day trade would still typically be unreportable in the southern 

most region). The main downside to this combination is, as we have discussed elsewhere, 

combining CO/WY with NE would dilute the information content in the current NE report alone 

and similarly for the KS market by combining it with the TX/OK/NM region. We consider this a 

potentially second-best option relative to our recommended option.
60 | Page

Figure 16. Alternative Alignment 2 for Regional Market Reporting (Percentages Reported are 

National Negotiated Domestic Head Represented by Region, 2014-18) 

34%

42%

22%
61 | Page

Appendix The appendix was included to report results of additional detailed statistical data analysis that 

we conducted on the negotiated transactions. Comparing price instability coefficients between 

markets has been proposed as an alternative to price correlation coefficients or cointegration 

models for measuring market integration.11 This approached is proposed as a step towards 

advancing spatial price analysis when price time series are relatively short, not uniform and 

missing data exist. The price instability coefficient for a given market expresses the average 

price deviation from the trend in percentage of the mean price, such that:

(%) = 100 ∗ ��√∑� ̈

ii − ii�

2

��( ∗ �)� ( 1)

where ̈

ii is the predicted price on the trend line ( ̈ii = a + bt), t is the time or market day 

number; ii is the actual price on market date t, and � is the average price over T number of 

market days or periods (weeks in this study).12 This provides a unit free measure of relative 

dispersion.

The price spread between two integrated markets is assumed to be approximately constant 

over time.13 If the price spread is not constant, the price instability coefficient will be high and 

market integration would be low. In other words, the greater is the difference in price 

instability coefficients, the less likely will price movements be parallel and the less will the 

markets be integrated.11

Table A1 shows the price instability coefficients for the 13 states considered in the analysis

completed and reported earlier. NM has the largest average deviation of prices from the trend. 

The value for NM is 2.52% meaning that the deviation from trend over the 260 weeks of this 

study is 2.52% of the mean price. Such a large value for NM in comparison to the 12 other 

states is expected as there were only 13 weeks of the 260 that had transactions for NM. OK, 

with 227 weekly transactions, has the next highest price instability coefficient at 0.60%. At 

0.54%, Texas has the lowest price instability coefficient.

Table A2 shows differences in price instability coefficients between successive state pairs. The 

differences are sorted in ascending order for ease in interpretation. The lower the difference 

between the price instability coefficients of two states, the greater the integration among 

prices from these states. Low volume markets may not be integrated with higher volume 

markets because of problems associated with "thin" markets (Tomek, 1980).14 This explains 

 11 Honfoga, B.G., G. N’tandou-Bonzitou, R.S. Vodouhè, M.R. Bellon, and J.D. Hounhouigan. 2018. Assessing the Role 

of Market Integration in the Consumption of Traditional Foods in Benin: A Joint Price Instability Coefficient and 

Diet Composition Approach. Agricultural and Food Economics 6:2. DOI 10.1186/s40100-018-0097-1 12 Heidingsfield, M.S. and A.B. Blankenship. 1974. Marketing. In: Harper and Row, Barnes and Noble Book Edition. 13 Delgado, C.L. 1986. A Variance Components Approach to Food Grain Market Integration in Northern Nigeria. 

American Journal of Agricultural Economics 68(4): 970-979. 14 Tomek, W.G. 1980. Price Behavior on a Declining Terminal Market. American Journal of Agricultural Economics

62(3): 434-444.
62 | Page

why market integration is the lowest for NM and OK. This measure of market integration, 

provides support for combining SD and IL with IA and MN to create an IA/MN/SD/IL regional 

market. For example when considering IL, SD, and MN price instability coefficients to that of IA, 

IL has the smallest difference (0.0001), SD the third smallest (0.0020), and MN the fourth 

smallest (0.0021). This conclusion is consistent when considering IL or MN as the base 

comparison as well. However, when the SD coefficient is compared to that of other states, SD is 

most integrated with CO as the difference in coefficients is 0.0007 compared to 0.0020 for SD 

and IA. 

The average price deviation from the trend does show how stable a particular market is and 

comparing price instability coefficients across markets has been shown to be one approach for 

measuring market integration. However, by itself this measure may be inadequate as a proof of 

market integration; it can only serve as an indicator of likelihoods given many assumptions 

about market structure and conduct.

A better way to potentially measure market integration within the price instability coefficient

methodology would be to account for heterogeneity in prices and then examine differences. 

Research suggests that empirical tests of market integration are best carried out using prices of 

primary homogeneous commodities.15 In the framework of hedonic prices, it is not the 

commodities themselves that are valued but instead the utility bearing attributes of the 

commodities.16 Negotiated fed cattle bearing different attributes, that is differentiated based 

on several cattle and transaction characteristics, should have different values and thus different 

prices. Market integration may be improperly rejected due to this heterogeneous price data.

From equation (A1) we redefine ̈

ii as the predicted price from the hedonic model estimated 

earlier in this report. The model is estimated each week for the 260 weeks and weekly 

predicted prices calculated. Table A3 shows the price instability coefficients based on the 

hedonic regression method. Similar to the previous measure, NM and OK have the largest 

average deviation of prices. However, under this measure IA has the smallest price instability 

coefficient, i.e., the lowest coefficient of variation for all the individual transaction prices 

around the predicted hedonic price. 

Table A4 shows differences in these alternative price instability coefficients. These findings help 

confirm the results in market integration that were observed using the previous approach. That 

is IA, MN, SD, and IL are all highly integrated. An interesting, but not entirely unexpected, result 

under this new approach is that NE is most integrated with IA and SD. This makes intuitive 

sense given these three states share at least one border. TX and CO are shown to have high 

market integration as is the case with KS and WY.

 15 Goodwin, B.K. and T.C. Schroeder. 1990. Testing Perfect Spatial Market Integration: An Application to Regional 

U.S. Cattle Markets. North Central Journal of Agricultural Economics 12(2): 173-186. 16 Rosen, S. 1974. Hedonic Prices and Implicit Markets. Journal of Political Economy 82(1): 34-55.
63 | Page

A criticism of the approach so far may be that price deviations may not fully capture the 

structure of price linkages. That is, just because pairs of market prices have large or small 

variation (so their differences in variation are small) does not necessarily imply their variations 

from week to week are highly related to each other. To test for this, we calculated correlations

of hedonic price prediction errors to observe how weekly weighted average prices and hedonic 

model predicted prices relay information about integration of prices. The idea here is that if 

hedonic price prediction errors across states are highly correlated, these markets are likely 

moving in similar directions relative to the hedonic model predictions and as such prices in 

these markets might be well-aligned with each other.

Table A5 shows the correlation coefficients. The correlations are sorted in descending order for 

ease in interpretation. A value of 0 shows no linear relationship, while ±0.30 is a weak 

relationship, ±0.50 a moderate relationship, ±0.70 a strong relationship, and exactly ±1 a 

perfect relationship. Again, this supports combining SD and IL with IA/MN. Combining WY with 

KS, NE, or CO would be supported based on the moderately strong correlation. TX and KS were 

found to have the highest correlation when comparing weekly weighted average prices and 

hedonic model predicted prices. Markets such as NE and TX; KS and IA; SD and TX; or CO and TX 

would not be viable candidates to combine, for example, based on this analysis since they have 

lower than 0.55 correlations. Combining markets that have divergent price patterns reduces

market information content.
64 | Page

Table A1. Price Instability Coefficients Based on Trend Regressions

State T I(%)

CO 254 0.5474416009

IA 260 0.5501764130

IL 260 0.5502515908

IN 259 0.5443762653

KS 260 0.5409443488

MN 260 0.5522617962

NE 260 0.5446024014

NM 13 2.5158727107

OH 260 0.5503422825

OK 227 0.5974905674

SD 260 0.5481758363

TX 256 0.5380521065

WY 251 0.5605981463

Table A2. Differences in Price Instability Coefficients between State Pairs (Trend Regressions)

State I diff State I diff State I diff State I diff State I diff State I diff State I diff State I diff State I diff State I diff State I diff State I diff State I diff

SD 0.0007 IL 0.0001 IA 0.00008 NE 0.0002 TX 0.0029 OH 0.0019 IN 0.0002 OK 1.9184 IL 0.0001 WY 0.0369 CO 0.0007 KS 0.0029 MN 0.0083

IA 0.0027 OH 0.0002 OH 0.00009 CO 0.0031 IN 0.0034 IL 0.0020 CO 0.0028 WY 1.9553 IA 0.0002 MN 0.0452 IA 0.0020 IN 0.0063 OH 0.0103

IL 0.0028 SD 0.0020 MN 0.0020 KS 0.0034 NE 0.0037 IA 0.0021 SD 0.0036 MN 1.9636 MN 0.0019 OH 0.0471 IL 0.0021 NE 0.0066 IL 0.0103

NE 0.0028 MN 0.0021 SD 0.0021 SD 0.0038 CO 0.0065 SD 0.0041 KS 0.0037 OH 1.9655 SD 0.0022 IL 0.0472 OH 0.0022 CO 0.0094 IA 0.0104

OH 0.0029 CO 0.0027 CO 0.0028 IA 0.0058 SD 0.0072 CO 0.0048 IA 0.0056 IL 1.9656 CO 0.0029 IA 0.0473 NE 0.0036 SD 0.0101 SD 0.0124

IN 0.0031 NE 0.0056 NE 0.0056 IL 0.0059 IA 0.0092 NE 0.0077 IL 0.0056 IA 1.9657 NE 0.0057 SD 0.0493 IN 0.0038 IA 0.0121 CO 0.0132

MN 0.0048 IN 0.0058 IN 0.0059 OH 0.0060 IL 0.0093 IN 0.0079 OH 0.0057 SD 1.9677 IN 0.0060 CO 0.0500 MN 0.0041 IL 0.0122 NE 0.0160

KS 0.0065 KS 0.0092 KS 0.0093 TX 0.0063 OH 0.0094 WY 0.0083 TX 0.0066 CO 1.9684 KS 0.0094 NE 0.0529 KS 0.0072 OH 0.0123 IN 0.0162

TX 0.0094 WY 0.0104 WY 0.0103 MN 0.0079 MN 0.0113 KS 0.0113 MN 0.0077 NE 1.9713 WY 0.0103 IN 0.0531 TX 0.0101 MN 0.0142 KS 0.0197

WY 0.0132 TX 0.0121 TX 0.0122 WY 0.0162 WY 0.0197 TX 0.0142 WY 0.0160 IN 1.9715 TX 0.0123 KS 0.0565 WY 0.0124 WY 0.0225 TX 0.0225

OK 0.0500 OK 0.0473 OK 0.0472 OK 0.0531 OK 0.0565 OK 0.0452 OK 0.0529 KS 1.9749 OK 0.0471 TX 0.0594 OK 0.0493 OK 0.0594 OK 0.0369

NM 1.9684 NM 1.9657 NM 1.9656 NM 1.9715 NM 1.9749 NM 1.9636 NM 1.9713 TX 1.9778 NM 1.9655 NM 1.9184 NM 1.9677 NM 1.9778 NM 1.9553

CO IA IL IN KS MN NE NM OH OK SD TX WY
65 | Page

Table A3. Price Instability Coefficients Based on Hedonic Regressions

State T I(%)

CO 254 0.0603331371

IA 260 0.0409178932

IL 260 0.0531060976

IN 259 0.0683602170

KS 260 0.0555222522

MN 260 0.0504931363

NE 260 0.0416268575

NM 13 0.3725414839

OH 260 0.0678423265

OK 227 0.1050580562

SD 260 0.0432369846

TX 256 0.0626902568

WY 251 0.0546170248

Table A4. Differences in Price Instability Coefficients between State Pairs (Hedonic Regressions)

State I diff State I diff State I diff State I diff State I diff State I diff State I diff State I diff State I diff State I diff State I diff State I diff State I diff

TX 0.0024 NE 0.0007 WY 0.0015 OH 0.0005 WY 0.0009 IL 0.0026 IA 0.0007 OK 0.2675 IN 0.0005 IN 0.0367 NE 0.0016 CO 0.0024 KS 0.0009

KS 0.0048 SD 0.0023 KS 0.0024 TX 0.0057 IL 0.0024 WY 0.0041 SD 0.0016 IN 0.3042 TX 0.0052 OH 0.0372 IA 0.0023 OH 0.0052 IL 0.0015

WY 0.0057 MN 0.0096 MN 0.0026 CO 0.0080 CO 0.0048 KS 0.0050 MN 0.0089 OH 0.3047 CO 0.0075 TX 0.0424 MN 0.0073 IN 0.0057 MN 0.0041

IL 0.0072 IL 0.0122 CO 0.0072 KS 0.0128 MN 0.0050 SD 0.0073 IL 0.0115 TX 0.3099 KS 0.0123 CO 0.0447 IL 0.0099 KS 0.0072 CO 0.0057

OH 0.0075 WY 0.0137 TX 0.0096 WY 0.0137 TX 0.0072 NE 0.0089 WY 0.0130 CO 0.3122 WY 0.0132 KS 0.0495 WY 0.0114 WY 0.0081 TX 0.0081

IN 0.0080 KS 0.0146 SD 0.0099 IL 0.0153 SD 0.0123 IA 0.0096 KS 0.0139 KS 0.3170 IL 0.0147 WY 0.0504 KS 0.0123 IL 0.0096 SD 0.0114

MN 0.0098 CO 0.0194 NE 0.0115 MN 0.0179 OH 0.0123 CO 0.0098 CO 0.0187 WY 0.3179 MN 0.0173 IL 0.0520 CO 0.0171 MN 0.0122 NE 0.0130

SD 0.0171 TX 0.0218 IA 0.0122 SD 0.0251 IN 0.0128 TX 0.0122 TX 0.0211 IL 0.3194 SD 0.0246 MN 0.0546 TX 0.0195 SD 0.0195 OH 0.0132

NE 0.0187 OH 0.0269 OH 0.0147 NE 0.0267 NE 0.0139 OH 0.0173 OH 0.0262 MN 0.3220 NE 0.0262 SD 0.0618 OH 0.0246 NE 0.0211 IA 0.0137

IA 0.0194 IN 0.0274 IN 0.0153 IA 0.0274 IA 0.0146 IN 0.0179 IN 0.0267 SD 0.3293 IA 0.0269 NE 0.0634 IN 0.0251 IA 0.0218 IN 0.0137

OK 0.0447 OK 0.0641 OK 0.0520 OK 0.0367 OK 0.0495 OK 0.0546 OK 0.0634 NE 0.3309 OK 0.0372 IA 0.0641 OK 0.0618 OK 0.0424 OK 0.0504

NM 0.3122 NM 0.3316 NM 0.3194 NM 0.3042 NM 0.3170 NM 0.3220 NM 0.3309 IA 0.3316 NM 0.3047 NM 0.2675 NM 0.3293 NM 0.3099 NM 0.3179

CO IA IL IN KS MN NE NM OH OK SD TX WY
66 | Page

Table A5. Correlations of Weekly Hedonic Price Prediction Errors

State corr State corr State corr State corr State corr State corr State corr State corr State corr State corr State corr State corr State corr

NE 0.7441 SD 0.7513 IA 0.6636 IL 0.4091 TX 0.7705 IA 0.6194 CO 0.7441 OK 0.2608 IN 0.4061 WY 0.4075 IA 0.7513 KS 0.7705 KS 0.6004

KS 0.6358 NE 0.7193 SD 0.6039 OH 0.4061 NE 0.6715 NE 0.5906 IA 0.7193 CO 0.2081 IL 0.3337 KS 0.4039 IL 0.6039 NE 0.5366 NE 0.5056

MN 0.5101 IL 0.6636 NE 0.4530 IA 0.2917 CO 0.6358 CO 0.5101 KS 0.6715 TX 0.1933 IA 0.3053 TX 0.2804 NE 0.5724 CO 0.4912 CO 0.5024

WY 0.5024 MN 0.6194 MN 0.4255 MN 0.2850 WY 0.6004 SD 0.5062 MN 0.5906 WY 0.1779 SD 0.2689 CO 0.2752 MN 0.5062 WY 0.4768 TX 0.4768

TX 0.4912 KS 0.4788 IN 0.4091 CO 0.2675 IA 0.4788 IL 0.4255 SD 0.5724 KS 0.1133 MN 0.2540 NM 0.2608 CO 0.3941 IA 0.4328 OK 0.4075

IA 0.3978 TX 0.4328 KS 0.3809 NE 0.2419 OK 0.4039 TX 0.4232 TX 0.5366 NE -0.0053 NE 0.1796 NE 0.1692 KS 0.3804 MN 0.4232 IA 0.3385

SD 0.3941 CO 0.3978 OH 0.3337 SD 0.2367 MN 0.4020 KS 0.4020 WY 0.5056 IA -0.0645 KS 0.1278 IL 0.1661 TX 0.3588 SD 0.3588 MN 0.3067

IL 0.3201 WY 0.3385 TX 0.3303 KS 0.1941 IL 0.3809 WY 0.3067 IL 0.4530 MN -0.0898 CO 0.1238 IN 0.1575 OH 0.2689 IL 0.3303 SD 0.2469

OK 0.2752 OH 0.3053 CO 0.3201 OK 0.1575 SD 0.3804 IN 0.2850 IN 0.2419 SD -0.1294 TX 0.1175 SD 0.1173 WY 0.2469 OK 0.2804 IL 0.2126

IN 0.2675 IN 0.2917 WY 0.2126 WY 0.1507 IN 0.1941 OH 0.2540 OH 0.1796 IL -0.1758 WY 0.0760 IA 0.1143 IN 0.2367 NM 0.1933 NM 0.1779

NM 0.2081 OK 0.1143 OK 0.1661 TX 0.1454 OH 0.1278 OK 0.0487 OK 0.1692 OH -0.2687 OK 0.0008 MN 0.0487 OK 0.1173 IN 0.1454 IN 0.1507

OH 0.1238 NM -0.0645 NM -0.1758 NM -0.4551 NM 0.1133 NM -0.0898 NM -0.0053 IN -0.4551 NM -0.2687 OH 0.0008 NM -0.1294 OH 0.1175 OH 0.0760

CO IA IL IN KS MN NE NM OH OK SD TX WY
67 | Page

To further determine how negotiated transaction information would be affected under 

alternative regional market alignment, we evaluated how percent Choice levels and variability 

was impacted by adding more states of cattle origin to the price reporting regions.

Table A6 reports summary statistics for weighted-average percent Choice levels by region and 

alignment, and t-tests of mean differences in prices. Findings for percent Choice differentials 

across alignments within regions are mixed, as some alternative alignments have higher values 

and others have lower values, compared to the base alignment. Within Region 1 there is no 

statistical difference in mean percent Choice for IA/MN and IA/MN/SD/IL. However, between 

IA/MN and IA/MN/IL/IN/OH the difference is 0.32 with the IA/MN/IL/IN/OH alignment having 

higher percent Choice levels than IA/MN on average over the five-year period. For Region 2, 

combining CO and WY with NE decreases the percent Choice level by 0.45, while adding SD, 

CO/WY/SD, or SD/WY to NE increases percent Choice by 0.65, 0.20, and 0.64, respectively. 

When TX/OK/NM is added to KS in Region 3 the mean percent Choice level is 1.66 lower. The 

addition of CO and WY to KS increases percent Choice by 1.22. The one possible realignment to 

Region 4 is adding CO to TX/OK/NM and leads to a 5.09 higher percent Choice. Adding WY and 

SD to CO in Region 5, increases the percent Choice level by 6.19. However, when just WY is 

added to CO percent Choice only increases by 1.42.

In general, alternative alignments have less impact on mean percent Choice levels than 

aggregation to a 5-Area or National level. Both 5-Area and National percent Choice levels are 

lower than those in IA/MN by 6.65 and 5.85, respectively. Five-Area and National percent 

Choice levels are lower than those in NE by 1.25 and 0.45, respectively. For Regions 3, 4, and 5, 

5-Area and National percent Choice levels are higher than the base. For example, KS percent 

Choice levels are 8.20 to 9.00 lower than the 5-Area and National composites. TX/OK/NM has 

15.49 to 16.30 lower and CO have 4.09 to 4.88 lower percent Choice levels than aggregation at 

the 5-Area and National level, respectively. 

Table A7 reports percent Choice spreads by region and alignment, and paired t-tests of mean 

differences in spreads. A percentile range between the 15th percentile and the 85th percentile 

for each base and alternative alignment is used. For Regions 1, 2, 3, and 4 results reveal 

statistically larger spreads for alternative alignments relative to the base alignment in each 

region. The one exception is in Region 1 where this is no statistical difference between the 

spread of IA and IA/MN/IL/IN/OH. For Region 5, all of the alternative alignment spreads are 

lower than the base alignment CO spread. However, the difference in the spread between 

CO/WY and CO is not statistically different than zero.

Table A8 is an extension of Table A6 and reports the percentage of weeks the change in percent 

Choice level of alternative alignments compared to the base alignment in each region change 

falls in the intervals less than -5.00, -4.01 to -5.00, ..., 4.00 to 4.99, and greater than 5.00.

Comparing alternative alignment IA/MN/SD/IL to base alignment IA/MN shows that 99.2% of 

the time during the 2014-2018 period the change in percent Choice level was in the interval -

2.00 to 1.99. This means that 258 out of 260 weeks the change in percent Choice was within 

this range. The comparison of IA/MN/IL/IN/OH and IA/MN was even higher at 100.0% or 260
68 | Page

out of 260 weeks. For all alternative alignments compared to the base NE alignment in Region 

2, over 96% of the change in percent Choice level was within -2.00 to 1.99, or 252 weeks or 

greater. For Region 3, 64.2% and 73.8% of the change in percent Choice level was within -2.00

to 1.99, respectively, for the KS/TX/OK/NM to KS and KS/CO/WY to KS comparisons.

For alternative alignments compared to the base alignment in Regions 4 and 5 are where 

changes in mean percent Choice levels become much larger. For Region 4, only 18.6% of the 

time, or 48 out of 258 weeks was the change in percent Choice from TX/OK/NM to 

TX/OK/NM/CO in the -2.00 to 1.99 range. For Region 5, 15.0% and 68.9% of the change in

percent Choice level was within -2.00 to 1.99, respectively, for the CO/WY/SD to CO and CO/WY 

to CO comparisons. Similar to what is shown in Table A6, potential alternative alignments have 

less impact on the change in percent Choice level than aggregation to a 5-Area or National 

level.

Table A9 is an extension of Table A7 and reports the percentage of weeks the {Ch15 − Ch85} 

percent Choice spread falls in the range 0.0 to greater than 30.0. We consider the percentage of 

weeks that the price spread, for each base alignment is between 0 and 19.99. This shows that 

for IA/MN, 90.8% of the variation in the percent Choice level is within 0 to 19.99. This is 236 out 

of 260 weeks. This same measurement for NE, KS, TX/OK/NM, and CO is 65.0%, 38.8%, 36.8%, 

and 37.8%, respectively. As expected, in general, variability in percent Choice level increases (a 

lower percentage is within the 0.0 to 19.99 range) as additional states are added to make up 

potential alternative alignments. However, there are two exceptions. When WY and SD are 

combined with CO or when just WY is combined with CO, 51.9% (compared to 37.8%) or 39.6% 

(compared to 37.8%) of the variation in percent Choice level is within the 0.0 to 19.99 range.

While this additional analysis is a valuable demonstration of variation in reported quality grade 

associated with alternative regional alignments, it remains important to recognize the quality 

grade field is an estimate and therefore is not confirmed. In the hedonic modeling analyses 

(Table 10) unexpected results regarding the marginal effect of percent Choice are an example 

of potential errors in estimated percentage Choice data field.
69 | Page

Table A6. Summary Statistics for Weighted Average Percent Choice Level by Region and Alignment, 2014-2018

Mean Correlation

Alignment State(s) N Mean Std Dev Min Max Difference1 Pr > |t| Coefficient Pr > |t|

Region 1

1 IA/MN 260 82.576 3.34 75.22 90.40

2 IA/MN/SD/IL 260 82.523 3.21 75.61 90.38 -0.0525 0.2012 0.98046 <0.0001

3 thru 10 IA/MN/IL/IN/OH 260 82.893 3.43 75.35 91.08 0.3174 <0.0001 0.98902 <0.0001

11 5 Area 260 75.926 3.25 66.75 84.63 -6.6496 <0.0001 0.80588 <0.0001

12 National 260 76.723 3.21 68.37 85.24 -5.8527 <0.0001 0.82191 <0.0001

Region 2

1, 3, 5 NE 260 77.176 3.22 69.02 84.22

2 NE/CO/WY 260 76.728 3.29 68.91 83.88 -0.4478 <0.0001 0.98103 <0.0001

4, 6, 8 NE/SD 260 77.824 3.10 70.37 84.76 0.6488 <0.0001 0.98482 <0.0001

7, 10 NE/CO/WY/SD 260 77.377 3.17 70.04 84.46 0.2011 <0.0001 0.96986 <0.0001

9 NE/SD/WY 260 77.815 3.11 70.40 84.76 0.6397 <0.0001 0.98432 <0.0001

11 5 Area 260 75.926 3.25 66.75 84.63 -1.2493 <0.0001 0.87056 <0.0001

12 National 260 76.723 3.21 68.37 85.24 -0.4524 <0.0001 0.87003 <0.0001

Region 3

1, 3, 4, 7, 9 KS 260 67.723 6.36 52.91 81.07

2, 5, 6, 10 KS/TX/OK/NM 260 66.063 5.89 52.24 81.07 -1.6600 <0.0001 0.98074 <0.0001

8 KS/CO/WY 260 68.940 5.76 55.66 79.71 1.2172 <0.0001 0.96530 <0.0001

11 5 Area 260 75.926 3.25 66.75 84.63 8.2033 <0.0001 0.73337 <0.0001

12 National 260 76.723 3.21 68.37 85.24 9.0002 <0.0001 0.73683 <0.0001

Region 4

1 thru 8, 10 TX/OK/NM 258 60.406 6.09 35.00 76.40

9 TX/OK/NM/CO 260 65.536 5.33 51.83 78.24 5.0873 <0.0001 0.71868 <0.0001

11 5 Area 260 75.926 3.25 66.75 84.63 15.4947 <0.0001 0.54974 <0.0001

12 National 260 76.723 3.21 68.37 85.24 16.2957 <0.0001 0.54783 <0.0001

Region 5

1, 2, 7 thru 10 CO 254 71.736 6.73 53.85 86.32

3, 5 CO/WY/SD 260 78.126 4.17 66.63 88.92 6.1906 <0.0001 0.72221 <0.0001

4, 6 CO/WY 260 73.431 6.35 56.49 97.00 1.4188 <0.0001 0.92714 <0.0001

11 5 Area 260 75.926 3.25 66.75 84.63 4.0937 <0.0001 0.51550 <0.0001

12 National 260 76.723 3.21 68.37 85.24 4.8818 <0.0001 0.52315 <0.0001 1 The paired t-test only use cases that have non-missing values for both variables. As such the mean differences for Regions 4 and 5 are different than would be 

calculated using the summary statistic means.
70 | Page

Table A7. Summary Statistics for Percent Choice Spreads by Region and Alignment, 2014-2018

Mean

Alignment State(s) N Mean Std Dev Min Max Difference1 Pr > |t|

Region 1

1 IA/MN 260 15.687 2.30 9.00 21.00

2 IA/MN/SD/IL 260 16.138 2.25 10.00 23.00 0.4512 <0.0001

3 thru 10 IA/MN/IL/IN/OH 260 15.772 2.26 10.00 23.00 0.0854 0.3959

11 5 Area 260 23.194 3.34 15.00 35.00 7.5073 <0.0001

12 National 260 23.177 3.09 15.00 36.00 7.4900 <0.0001

Region 2

1, 3, 5 NE 260 17.992 2.97 12.00 27.00

2 NE/CO/WY 260 18.417 3.13 12.00 26.00 0.4250 <0.0001

4, 6, 8 NE/SD 260 18.208 3.00 13.00 28.00 0.2154 0.0222

7, 10 NE/CO/WY/SD 260 18.515 3.08 12.00 28.00 0.5231 <0.0001

9 NE/SD/WY 260 18.233 3.01 12.00 28.00 0.2404 0.0098

11 5 Area 260 23.194 3.34 15.00 35.00 5.2019 <0.0001

12 National 260 23.177 3.09 15.00 36.00 5.1846 <0.0001

Region 3

1, 3, 4, 7, 9 KS 260 20.154 3.57 11.00 34.00

2, 5, 6, 10 KS/TX/OK/NM 260 21.637 3.44 11.00 35.00 1.4827 <0.0001

8 KS/CO/WY 260 21.524 3.89 12.00 34.00 1.3700 <0.0001

11 5 Area 260 23.194 3.34 15.00 35.00 3.0404 <0.0001

12 National 260 23.177 3.09 15.00 36.00 3.0231 <0.0001

Region 4

1 thru 8, 10 TX/OK/NM 258 20.597 7.01 0.00 48.00

9 TX/OK/NM/CO 260 25.817 5.43 12.00 44.00 5.2225 <0.0001

11 5 Area 260 23.194 3.34 15.00 35.00 2.6260 <0.0001

12 National 260 23.177 3.09 15.00 36.00 2.6047 <0.0001

Region 5

1, 2, 7 thru 10 CO 254 21.079 7.00 5.00 40.00

3, 5 CO/WY/SD 260 19.363 5.17 10.00 40.00 -1.613 0.0002

4, 6 CO/WY 260 20.475 6.99 0.00 45.00 -0.2972 0.3327

11 5 Area 260 23.194 3.34 15.00 35.00 2.1516 <0.0001

12 National 260 23.177 3.09 15.00 36.00 2.1181 <0.0001 1 The paired t-test only use cases that have non-missing values for both variables. As such the mean differences for 

Regions 4 and 5 are different than would be calculated using the summary statistic means.
71 | Page

Table A8. Change in Mean Percent Choice by Region and Alignment, 2014-2018

-4.01 to -3.01 to -2.01 to -1.01 to -0.01 to 0.00 to 1.00 to 2.00 to 3.00 to 4.00 to

Alignment State(s) < -5.00 -5.00 -4.00 -3.00 -2.00 -1.00 0.99 1.99 2.99 3.99 4.99 >= 5.00

Region 1 (Base = IA/MN vs. Alternative Alignment)

2 IA/MN/SD/IL 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.8% 6.5% 43.5% 45.0% 4.2% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

3 thru 10 IA/MN/IL/IN/OH 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.4% 28.1% 61.5% 10.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

11 5 Area 78.1% 13.8% 6.5% 1.5% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

12 National 65.0% 17.7% 11.9% 4.6% 0.8% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

Region 2 (Base = NE vs. Alternative Alignment)

2 NE/CO/WY 0.0% 0.0% 0.8% 1.5% 11.9% 61.5% 24.2% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

4, 6, 8 NE/SD 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 8.8% 67.7% 21.5% 1.5% 0.4% 0.0% 0.0%

7, 10 NE/CO/WY/SD 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.8% 5.4% 33.5% 45.4% 12.7% 1.9% 0.4% 0.0% 0.0%

9 NE/SD/WY 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 10.8% 65.0% 22.3% 1.5% 0.4% 0.0% 0.0%

11 5 Area 2.3% 2.3% 8.8% 16.9% 24.2% 26.2% 13.1% 3.8% 1.5% 0.4% 0.0% 0.4%

12 National 0.8% 1.2% 3.8% 10.8% 18.8% 24.2% 26.2% 7.7% 5.0% 0.8% 0.4% 0.4%

Region 3 (Base = KS vs. Alternative Alignment)

2, 5, 6, 10 KS/TX/OK/NM 2.3% 2.7% 10.4% 20.4% 30.4% 26.5% 7.3% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

8 KS/CO/WY 0.8% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 3.5% 13.5% 29.6% 27.3% 12.7% 8.5% 3.1% 1.2%

11 5 Area 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.4% 0.4% 0.0% 1.2% 3.8% 3.8% 7.7% 10.4% 72.3%

12 National 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.4% 0.0% 0.4% 0.8% 1.9% 2.7% 5.0% 7.7% 81.2%

Region 4 (Base = TX/OK/NM vs. Alternative Alignment)

9 TX/OK/NM/CO 1.2% 0.4% 0.4% 0.8% 1.2% 2.7% 7.0% 7.8% 10.9% 8.9% 11.2% 47.7%

11 5 Area 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.8% 0.4% 0.0% 0.0% 0.4% 98.4%

12 National 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.4% 0.4% 0.4% 0.0% 0.0% 98.8%

Region 5 (Base = CO vs. Alternative Alignment)

3, 5 CO/WY/SD 0.8% 0.0% 0.4% 0.4% 1.2% 1.2% 6.3% 6.3% 13.0% 7.9% 4.7% 57.9%

4, 6 CO/WY 1.2% 0.8% 0.0% 0.8% 3.1% 12.2% 35.0% 18.5% 13.0% 5.1% 3.1% 7.1%

11 5 Area 3.9% 2.0% 2.4% 7.1% 4.7% 6.7% 4.7% 7.1% 3.5% 9.1% 5.1% 43.7%

12 National 2.8% 1.6% 2.4% 3.5% 6.3% 4.3% 6.3% 5.1% 7.1% 5.1% 7.5% 48.0%
72 | Page

Table A9. Percent Choice Spreads by Region and Alignment, 2014-2018

0 to 10 to 12 to 14 to 16 to 18 to 20 to 22 to 24 to 26 to 28 to

Alignment State(s) 9.99 11.99 13.99 15.99 17.99 19.99 21.99 23.99 25.99 27.99 29.99 >= 30.00

Region 1

1 IA/MN 0.4% 2.7% 10.4% 45.8% 19.2% 12.3% 9.2% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

2 IA/MN/SD/IL 0.0% 2.3% 5.8% 43.8% 20.0% 16.9% 10.8% 0.4% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

3 thru 10 IA/MN/IL/IN/OH 0.0% 3.1% 8.1% 47.3% 21.9% 10.4% 8.8% 0.4% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

11 5 Area 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.4% 1.9% 6.5% 26.5% 18.8% 29.6% 7.7% 3.1% 5.4%

12 National 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.4% 2.3% 4.2% 23.5% 25.0% 28.5% 8.1% 4.2% 3.8%

Region 2

1 NE 0.0% 0.0% 4.2% 23.5% 15.8% 21.5% 26.2% 3.5% 4.2% 1.2% 0.0% 0.0%

2 NE/CO/WY 0.0% 0.0% 3.5% 21.2% 13.8% 21.2% 25.8% 6.5% 7.3% 0.8% 0.0% 0.0%

4, 6, 8 NE/SD 0.0% 0.0% 1.9% 24.2% 14.2% 22.3% 26.5% 5.0% 3.8% 1.2% 0.8% 0.0%

7, 10 NE/CO/WY/SD 0.0% 0.0% 1.9% 21.2% 15.0% 20.8% 27.7% 5.4% 6.9% 0.8% 0.4% 0.0%

9 NE/SD/WY 0.0% 0.0% 2.3% 22.7% 15.4% 21.2% 28.5% 3.5% 4.6% 1.5% 0.4% 0.0%

11 5 Area 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.4% 1.9% 6.5% 26.5% 18.8% 29.6% 7.7% 3.1% 5.4%

12 National 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.4% 2.3% 4.2% 23.5% 25.0% 28.5% 8.1% 4.2% 3.8%

Region 3

1 KS 0.0% 0.4% 2.7% 5.4% 13.1% 17.3% 30.4% 15.8% 8.1% 3.5% 2.3% 1.2%

2, 5, 6, 10 KS/TX/OK/NM 0.0% 0.4% 0.0% 3.5% 6.2% 7.7% 35.0% 22.7% 15.8% 3.1% 3.8% 1.9%

8 KS/CO/WY 0.0% 0.0% 1.5% 3.1% 10.0% 14.2% 25.4% 16.9% 15.4% 5.4% 2.7% 5.4%

11 5 Area 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.4% 1.9% 6.5% 26.5% 18.8% 29.6% 7.7% 3.1% 5.4%

12 National 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.4% 2.3% 4.2% 23.5% 25.0% 28.5% 8.1% 4.2% 3.8%

Region 4

1 TX/OK/NN 3.9% 4.7% 3.1% 13.6% 5.0% 6.6% 21.7% 7.4% 15.1% 4.7% 4.3% 10.1%

9 TX/OK/NM/CO 0.0% 0.0% 0.4% 3.5% 1.2% 2.7% 15.0% 9.6% 23.8% 7.7% 8.8% 27.3%

11 5 Area 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.4% 1.9% 6.5% 26.5% 18.8% 29.6% 7.7% 3.1% 5.4%

12 National 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.4% 2.3% 4.2% 23.5% 25.0% 28.5% 8.1% 4.2% 3.8%

Region 5

1 CO 2.8% 7.1% 4.3% 11.4% 7.1% 5.1% 17.7% 7.5% 16.1% 3.5% 2.0% 15.4%

3, 5 CO/WY/SD 0.0% 2.7% 6.5% 18.8% 14.6% 9.2% 21.9% 4.2% 11.5% 1.9% 3.5% 5.0%

4, 6 CO/WY 3.5% 4.2% 8.1% 11.5% 5.4% 6.9% 18.8% 8.8% 15.4% 2.7% 2.7% 11.9%

11 5 Area 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.4% 1.9% 6.5% 26.5% 18.8% 29.6% 7.7% 3.1% 5.4%

12 National 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.4% 2.3% 4.2% 23.5% 25.0% 28.5% 8.1% 4.2% 3.8%

END