ONLINE wool sales dropped in Australia last week as the physical auction prices suffered a sharp decline.

After the AWEX Eastern Market Indicator fell 98 cents to 1511c/kg clean last week, AuctionsPlus regional sales associate Ed Murphy said the sentiment at physical auctions was reflected online with just 65 bales sold on AuctionsPlus Wool.

He said the top online price for the week was 1183c/kg greasy, or 1768c/kg clean, for a three-bale line of 16.7 micron AAAM fleece wool. The line yielded 66.9 percent with an average staple length of 81mm, a tensile strength of 36 Newtons/kilotex and 0.8pc vegetable matter content.

A two-bale line of 20.6 micron Merino pieces sold for 600c/kg greasy or 1200c/kg clean. It had a yield of 50pc, was 58mm long, with a tensile strength of 40N/kt and 12.7pc vm.

Mr Murphy said a four-bale line of 20.8 micron Merino cardings sold for 593c/kg greasy or 1147c/kg clean, reflecting the only positive aspect of auction sales last week, when Merino cardings went against the grain to sell firm or gain 7-12 cents at all selling centres.

Mr Murphy said a lack of confident buyers was reported at auctions last week.

“It was also reported from physical auction that buying at the start of auction on the first day at the at all centres was slow from the beginning to end as both days saw a large amount of withdrawals and pass ins.

“The market continued to lose ground on the second day despite large quantities of the lower quality wool still being discounted,” he said.

At the southern selling centre a lack of support for even the better style wools was recorded, with the Merino price indicators losing value and the poorer styles copping much heavier discounts. The national auction passed-in rate was 33.5pc last week. The largest price falls were for 19-21 micron wools and large amounts of the finer wool types were discounted, leading to the Merino wool indicators having mixed results across the three selling centres, but largely ending the week down more than 140 cents.

“This week the volume of supply remains the same with 34,000 bales on offer.

“It is expected the market will continue along the same path as last week, although with most of the online sales happening after auction last week, the market my remain recover some,” he said.