Do you think Covid has affected the global fur market? I think it has. Let's hear your ideas.

Most definitely, wether positive or negative I’m not sure yet. The mink ranches had to destroy millions of mink because they are susceptible to covid, so that’s going to put a bottleneck on the supply of ranch mink. Will the furriers decide to use wild fur in its place? I think they probably will. That will drive up the price some if they do.

Then again with all these different shutdowns in different countries, will people be able to get out and buy fur? Will they have any money to buy it with? Hard to say. That might choke the demand down. After all the craziness this year nothing will surprise me lol

Thing is on the ranch mink, how many, if any, were pelted?

I believe they were ordered to gas them and bury them without pelting. I have seen several pictures of a front end loader covering up or dumping mink in a ditch that still had pelts on

But the Russians and Chinese are our major market and they have been both been hit hard with covid.

Apparently it is creating a spike in the sales of fur garments in NYC.
Also a big increase here,locally.

The Chinese market is evolving quickly. Amazon makes a lot of money doing deliveries. Groceries, shoes, all sorts of clothing. Fur is probably in there somewhere. Even beggars have QR codes and cellphone bank accounts so they don’t have to handle cash directly. Fur shopping won’t be any different.

It comes down to supply and demand. I was told by a buyer that there are only 2-3 buyers in MN that are even taking coons. And the price MIGHT buy you a Big Mac. It doesn't matter what country you live in, if you are sick and unemployed you are not buying fur.

I think one big thing that is one big affect on fur prices is Oil. With the US not being dependent on foreign oil. With the Russians (huge consumer of fur) losing a huge customer, there economy is being affected the same way ours gets affected but a drop in oil prices. This sucks for fur prices but is all around better for our country so I don’t mind. You put that with everything happening in China (who is a big buyer, manufacturer, and consumer of fur) you have the perfect storm. Covid has slowed down Chinese production, hurting their economy (just one of many things affecting this).

The only positive thing with Biden is fur prices should go up again, but that’s only because he’s hurting the country as a whole.

No offense but you are trying to connect the wrong dots. Oil is not the major player for Russia. If the price is down, they just sit on it or pump it into strategic reserve. When the price goes back up, they sell. Russia's Ace of Spades is their staggering Natural Gas reserves.

Once auctions can return to normal sales levels, we’ll start to see the market return to precovid normal.

No one in the US saved their stimulus funds. Manufacturers are having record years. If the interest in fur in the US could attract a little bit of interest, there’s plenty of money to push prices up.

I wouldn’t say no one saved their stimulus. I did, still have it. Might take that and the new stimulus and pay cash for 20 acres though. Land is cheap out here

I wouldnt say 1200 bucks is mad money when a majority of people were off work for months at a time.....

I’m a commercial banker. I’ve seen the financial results of the companies. People spent the Covid funds.

Well sure most did but it wasnt on fur coats is my point.

$1200 + $600 = $1800. For 20 acres. I'd be buying land too

Turtledale you forget that I have a family. $1200 for me, 1200 for my wife, 500 for each of my 4 kids last time. This time 600 each. For $8k cash you can buy 20 acres here. Heck there’s a whole section, 640 acres for sale out of town a ways, $70k buys it.

I don't know about other countries but Denmark did not eradicated their mink herd. They did dispatch the infected ranches and those within a specific distance from those infected. We will have to wait and see what percentage of the roughly 15 million mink in Denmark that will be. I know the US ranch losses were not really very high as of yet.
Will this help the fur market? Maybe not so much this season or the next but if the inventory of old pelts declines that will help. Rats may benefit some this season due to ranch mink numbers declining and some upward movement in lower grade ranch mink.

Bryce

I read that the ranches that eradicated all of their mink were pelting the ones that didn’t test positive for COVID. Not sure if it went that way or not. Read it when all this started coming out.

That 640 acres here would cost between 640K and 768K depending on the bidding. Go for it.