But the market participants disagree on whether the coming week’s prices are stable or rising.
A fish farmer sees rising salmon prices for the fish to be delivered next week:[factbox]
“Up, NOK 64-66 (EUR 6.3-6.5) for 4-6 kg,” he says, and adds: “Not sure about 6+ packages to China – NOK 85 (EUR 8.3) for sure.”
In that case, it means a hike from the last two weeks’ farmgate prices around EUR 6/kg for 4-5 kg of salmon.
Margin
He receives support from an exporter.
“There is an increase. Around NOK 60 (EUR 5.9) on 3-4 kg, one krone up on 4-5 kg, NOK 63 (EUR 6.2) on 5-6 kg, 6+ kg NOK 68 (EUR 6.7). 2-3 kg costs NOK 57 (EUR 5.6). These are our purchase prices. We still get a margin on this. So that’s good.”
He sees several drivers behind the rise:
“One thing is the currency, it has improved throughout the week, and there is a good push out there. The only drawback is transport. Logistics is a nightmare from end to end,” he says, adding that there are few trucks available, not least in northern Norway.
Trade
“I have even heard people who trade trucks. Not only fish are being traded, now trucks are also being traded. We hear from those who have paid between NOK 50,000 (EUR 4,900) and 60,000 (EUR 5,900) for trucks from the north to Oslo. Normally it is NOK 25,000-30,000, so it is a doubling.”
“You feel you could do more if you were confident about the logistics, so there is a solid bottleneck,” he says.
“Up 3-4 kroner”, writes an exporter in an SMS about the salmon price.
But not everyone shares the opinion about price increases.
Freeze
“Stable!”, writes another exporter.
“It goes more or less sideways. I don’t think it’s set that much. I would call them quite stable,” says one buyer. “It seems that quite a lot of fish is being frozen, both in Norway and abroad, at the moment,” he says, and points to prices of NOK 58 (EUR 5.7) for 3-4 kg and NOK 60 (EUR 5.9) for 4-5 kg.
It is in line with what another buyer says.
“Plus/minus NOK 60 (EUR 5.9) is what is being said around. Just under NOK 60 for 3-4 kg and NOK 63-64 (EUR 6.2-6.3) for 5-6 kg,” he says, and adds: “It will probably lie there for a week or three. It’s not an easy sell.”
