![Slight bounce in wool market but true upward trend a way off Slight bounce in wool market but true upward trend a way off](/images/transform/v1/crop/frm/XftCMkCcRPa3Vky3YfP3wJ/86a38b0f-dc69-423b-a7e6-a92f03437500.jpg/r0_1_1800_1013_w1200_h678_fmax.jpg)
Tighter supply of wool has caused an uptick in competition in the market over the past week, but more consistent price relief could still be months away.
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With Fremantle sitting out last week, Sydney and Melbourne experienced strength in the market thanks to buyers having orders to fill.
With just 26,897 bales offered up it was the smallest sale for not only this selling season, but since September 2020 and the Eastern Market Indicator lifted by 15c to 1152c, following a 7c lift the week prior.
Southern Aurora Markets partner Mike Avery said the balance of supply and demand was the main factor affecting any market movement, with South Africa's wool market now closed until late August.
"Demand is still pretty tepid really and we're seeing these bounces every now and then," he said.
"We saw one after Easter and then it pulled back and we've seen it now bounce off that low.
"The season now runs another four weeks or so... it's very hard to see that we'll break out of this pattern prior to that.
"This might be the signal that we're bouncing off the bottom that we hit in the last couple of weeks of May and we're just going a little bit better."
Mr Avery said it was too early to say that the market was really changing direction.
"More than likely it will be a slight movement up because volumes are very low and machinery still has to run," he said.
"If you look at what the forward markets are telling us, and the volume's fairly thin at the moment, we're probably going to be a little conservative into the first part of the spring... there's general optimism but the question is when will the recovery come?
"The forward markets are suggesting that it's further out than the optimists are saying, some are saying the springtime but most probably the general consensus would be later than that, the early part of 2025."
Mr Avery said pricing was quite sensitive to the US dollar at the moment, with buyers buying "hand to mouth".
"We hit our lows in the middle part of May but we have the recoveries that coincide with people having to fill orders... last week was a good example, there was no WA sale and everything was centred on the eastern seaboard and the market went up a bit because demand was strong enough to take all the stock that was there," he said.
"Passed in rates were very low so growers are selling, cash flow is important to them.
"The market is in a very temperamental state that it really depends on what immediate need is and that can be triggered by a few more export sales by the Chinese into Europe.
"There's no great stock in the pipeline so it's sensitive to any movement and sometimes that movement can be triggered by sentiment and not by fact.
"We haven't had a large uniform order from China where the mills suddenly need a lot more feed stock so the market's going to be pushed up.
"We haven't had those sorts of triggers as yet but when they come they will be significant because the pipeline is stable, everyone's working hand to mouth."