The Cattle Price Cycle: An Exploration in Simulation

The simulation of commodity prices has been undertaken using a myriad of techniques, with some omitting the cyclical component and others ignoring the presence of inter-temporal relationships expressed as autoregressive errors. This study examines the periodicity of cattle prices and the modeling of the cattle cycle for simulation purposes. The AIC criterion is used to determine lengths of various cycles to be included in a harmonic model, with a chained modeling approach providing the best representation of the cattle cycle.