What is a pound of gain worth this week?

Bos Nutrition Services publishes weekly value-of-gain tables for Missouri feeder cattle, built directly from the Missouri Department of Agriculture's Weekly Market Summary. New numbers every Monday. Free to use on any phone or computer.

Open the VoG tool

No sign-up. Works in your browser, and installs to your home screen like an app.

What the tool gives you

Five views of the Missouri feeder cattle market, each built to answer a question producers and consultants actually ask.

Weekly report

Fitted steer and heifer price curves and cumulative value-of-gain tables from 400, 500, and 600 lb bases, refreshed each Monday morning when the state report posts.

VoG calculator

Enter a purchase weight and a target sale weight and see what each added pound is worth at current Missouri prices.

Forecast

Forward value-of-gain projections built on CME Feeder Cattle futures and Missouri basis, with average daily gain you can adjust to match your cattle.

History

How Missouri feeder prices and value of gain have moved week to week, so this Monday's number has context.

Raw data

The parsed sale data behind every chart, with a link to the source report so you can check the numbers yourself.

How the numbers are made

Each week the tool reads the Missouri Weekly Feeder Cattle Weighted Average Report (Medium & Large 1 steers and heifers) published by the Missouri Department of Agriculture. Prices across the reported weight range are fitted with AICc-weighted polynomial models — an averaging approach that stays stable even when several candidate models fit the data nearly equally well.

Value of gain is the change in an animal's total value divided by the pounds added: what the market is paying, per hundredweight of gain, to move cattle from one weight to the next. It is the number to set against your cost of gain when deciding whether to sell now or put on more pounds. Values outside the published weight range are extended along a straight line and clearly flagged as extrapolated.

The forecast view adds CME Group Feeder Cattle futures, computing Missouri basis as the fitted local cash price minus the nearest-to-expiration contract, so forward projections reflect both the futures board and the local market.

All values are model-based estimates for informational and educational purposes — not price guarantees or marketing advice.

Common questions

What is value of gain?

Value of gain (VoG) is the extra revenue a heavier animal brings divided by the extra weight it took to get there, usually expressed in dollars per hundredweight of gain. Because lighter cattle sell for more per pound than heavier cattle, VoG is always different from the sale price itself — and comparing it to your cost of gain tells you whether added pounds pay.

Where does the data come from?

Cash prices come from the Missouri Department of Agriculture's Weekly Market Summary, posted Monday mornings. Futures quotes come from CME Group, with an automatic fallback source when quotes are delayed. Every weekly report in the tool links to the underlying state PDF.

What does it cost?

Nothing. The tool is free, runs in any modern browser, and can be installed to your phone's home screen so it opens like an app.