EU: Most malting groups continue full capacity production

Most EU malting groups have continued full capacity production for their domestic and export business, H. M. Gauger GmbH reported earlier in April.

Smaller, purely domestic maltsters, have slowed or even shut down production at times. Those companies resold some of their barley cover back to the trade.

As old crop malting barley supplies are very tight, a sudden demand wave by brewers would create problems. A large percentage of the malt production is bound by long-term agreements.

For crop 2021 brewers have covered little malt yet at fixed prices, nor priced barley against long-term agreements. They were encouraged by the recent downtrend of grain markets. It is interesting, though, that malting barley markets and therefore malt prices in the EU have followed both the bull and bear trends only very slowly, the analysts said.