Feeder cattle are a heterogeneous commodity whose prices differ in important ways relative to the cattle specified in the CME Group Feeder Cattle futures contract. This necessitates estimation of optimal feeder cattle hedge ratios to manage price risk. Corn price is an important and often overlooked consideration when estimating feeder cattle hedge ratios. Corn price impacts feeder cattle weight-price slides and associated hedge ratios, which can result in over- or under-hedging. Utilizing transaction data from four feeder cattle markets, we estimate hedge ratios conditioned on corn price and compare risk of using corn-conditioned hedge ratios to using hedge ratios not dependent on corn price. Feeder cattle hedge ratios vary substantially across time, sex, location, and weight, which necessitates more frequent and detailed hedge ratio estimation. However, hedging risk is not generally statistically or economically significantly reduced by using corn-conditioned hedge ratios.

饲养牛是一种异质商品，其价格与 CME 集团饲养牛期货合约中指定的牛有很大不同。这需要估计最佳饲养牛对冲比率来管理价格风险。在估算饲养牛对冲比率时，玉米价格是一个重要且经常被忽视的考虑因素。玉米价格会影响饲养牛体重价格下滑和相关的套期保值比率，这可能导致套期保值过度或不足。利用来自四个饲养牛市场的交易数据，我们估计了以玉米价格为条件的对冲比率，并比较了使用玉米条件对冲比率与使用不依赖于玉米价格的对冲比率的风险。饲养牛对冲比率随时间、性别、位置和体重的不同而有很大差异，这需要更频繁和更详细的对冲比率估计。