Today's Main Story: Ecuadorian shrimp prices fall a bit as Chinese buying slows ahead of Qingdao show Ecuadorian shrimp prices posted their first decline in some time earlier this week with quiet demand noted in the market. Traders have anecdotally reported a slowdown in Chinese buying ahead of next week’s Seafood Expo in Qingdao. China has become a key market for Ecuadorian product so we should get a better idea of Chinese buyer positions during the show. This will help clear up longer term market expectations for the rest of the year and into 2015. The Standing Committee for Research and Statistics, ICCAT’s scientific arm found the bluefin population in the Atlantic has recorded a surprising increase in abundance, in particular, in their spawning stock biomass. The report found increases for both west and east Atlantic bluefin stocks. "US bluefin fishermen are thrilled and relieved to hear from our scientists of the healthy abundance of West Atlantic bluefin biomass,” said Ralph Pratt, president of the American Bluefin Tuna Association. “The spectacular recovery of the east stock from what has been sometimes called 'the edge of fishery collapse' is also excellent news for US bluefin fishermen.” In other news the auction for B season pollock roe was held in Seattle last week, and overall average prices were down about 7% from the B season roe auction of 2013. According to John Sackton the lower prices were largely due to the overall production of nearly 60,000 tons of pollock roe, between Alaska and Russia, which is the largest volume available to the market in ten years. Finally, the 2013 edition of NOAA’s US Fisheries Report highlighted last year’s massive, record setting domestic salmon catch. The Alaskan salmon industry represented 95 percent of the total US salmon haul that topped one billion pounds. Altogether the total US seafood catch volumes and values were up from 2012.