The national restocker price has held fairly firm for the second quarter of 2025, sitting at a premium of around 10% year-on-year, as well as above the 10-year average. Given the significant turnoff figures and the seasonal weather conditions in parts of the country - be it too wet or too dry - they haven’t caught up to the five-year price trend yet. However, with northern buyers now headed south to source stock, they have got as close as they’ve been so far in 2025. But is it heifers or steers that make the most cents for restockers right now?
The National Restocker Steer Indicator closed out last week at 404¢/kg, its highest point since January (disregarding the three-day week). This was a 22% premium to year-ago prices, and only 8% below the five-year average. Considering supply, the 2025 first quarter slaughter was at its highest for that particular period for the past 10 years – this is showing significant resilience, up 11% on the longer-term average. It is likely being supported by southern and central NSW receiving some much-needed rainfall in the past fortnight, and the northern season really getting underway.
National restocker heifer prices have followed a similar course, reaching their strongest week-end figure since January of 326¢/kg, and travelling in a very similar vein to the steers when it comes to averages. They are, however, an extra 10% stronger than the same week last year (making them 33% higher), and this is in the face of a March-quarter Female Slaughter Rate of above 52%, well and truly in the destocking zone and the highest for that particular quarter in more than four decades (you can read more on this here).
So, how do the two compare? We can see from Figure 1 that when the beef herd is in its destocking phase, the steer to heifer premium is higher, while in the rebuilding phase, heifers trend within the 10% range of steers. If we look back at the destocking phases, we can see the discount was bigger in 2019 than in 2014/15, as it was primarily seasonally driven, rather than due to a peaking of the herd size. Comparatively, looking at this year, the steer premium is at 25% and has averaged 25% for 2025 so far, above the rebuilding figure, but more consistently lower than the last period of high female turnoff.
What does it mean?
The restocker steer premium over heifers is fairly historically standard during a significant destock, however given the extent of the dry conditions and slaughter sitting at record levels, we could have easily expected it to have increased further. If supply starts to shorten in the winter and northern buying support – both for backgrounding and updating females herds – continues as it is expected to, we could see this differential decrease further.
Key Points
- Restocker heifer prices are showing some resilience given the strength of the destock
- Heifer discount has tightened up in 2025, despite historically high FSR last quarter.
Click on figure to expand
Click on figure to expand
Data sources: Mecardo; Meat and Livestock Australia
