The December Position Report was released on Thursday, January 12th. The report was in line with industry expectations. Sales and shipping numbers have been sufficient based on the size of the 2022 crop, but these will need to start increasing if we want to bring down the large industry carryout.
Year to date 2022 crop receipts now total 2,376,431,199 pounds, which is 10.56% below the 2,656,868,800 pounds received last December. We have analyzed the delivery trends for the last five years in the graph below. Based on this, we feel that the 2022 crop deliveries are on a very similar path to 2019 and should land in the neighborhood of 2.50 billion pounds.
Total shipments for the month were 206.35 million pounds, this is an increase of 9.3% when compared to last year's 188.81 million pounds. Export shipments were 153.88 million pounds, which is up 23.6% from last December. Domestic shipments were 52.47 million pounds. This is down 18.4% versus last season's 64.30 million pounds. The surprise in this report was the decrease in domestic shipments, but luckily the exports performed well and were able to pick up the slack.
New sales for the month were 234.9 million pounds compared to 246.8 million pounds sold at this time last year. While we feel that the crop will land closer to 2.50 billion pounds, we still use 2.6 billion for the overall sold position since that is the industry estimate. Based on a 2.6-billion-pound crop, the year to date sold position is 50.7%. This time last year the industry was 54.0% sold.
The good news from this report is that we are starting to get a clearer picture of what the overall crop size will be. This will bring some stability to the market and buyers back to the table. Prices should remain relatively flat in the near future. As trading picks up, we should start to gain a penny here and there as sales become more fluid.
By this time next month, we should start to see some buds developing in the orchards and start to get our first indications of the 2023 crop. Bloom will be our next event that could have a significant impact on pricing. The perception of a large or small 2023 crop could move pricing in either direction.
