JAKARTA: Malaysian palm oil futures rose for a third day on Monday to their highest in six weeks, spurred by gains in competing markets, ahead of an important industry meeting in Malaysia, traders said.
"The market is pretty strong. Bean oil rallied on Friday
night and this morning the Dalian rallied, so our market has
taken a cue from there," a trader at a foreign commodities
brokerage in Kuala Lumpur told Reuters, referring to soybean oil
futures on China's Dalian Commodity Exchange.
Palm traders in Asia are watching authorities crack down on
a strike in Brazil that took soybean prices to their fourth week
of gains on Friday on concerns over disrupted supply.
The increase in palm oil was also a result of a weakening in
the ringgit, which edged down to 3.6300 to the dollar on
Monday, the trader added. A weaker ringgit, which has fallen
more than 15 pct since September, can support prices of the
ringgit-based commodity by effectively giving international
buyers a cheaper deal.
The benchmark March contract was up 2.95 percent to
2,373 ringgit ($654) per tonne, after touching 2,379 ringgit,
its highest level since Jan. 15. Traded volume stood at 41,871
lots of 25 tonnes each, above the usual 35,000 lots.
The gain in prices came despite a drop in exports from the
world's second-biggest producer. Exports of Malaysian palm oil
products in February fell 14.5 percent to 953,053 tonnes from
1,114,642 tonnes shipped in January, cargo surveyor Intertek
Testing Services (ITS) said on Monday.
"The market should hold definitely," another trader said,
adding that he expected prices to remain in the 2,300 to 2,400
ringgit range this week.
The future direction of palm oil prices is expected to hinge
on how crude oil prices impact demand for the tropical oil from
the biofuel sector, according to analysts and traders referring
to participant concerns at a key palm industry meeting in Kuala
Lumpur.
In competing vegetable oil markets, the most active May
soybean oil contract on the Dalian Commodity Exchange
rose 2.32 percent, while the U.S. soyoil contract for March
gained 1.52 percent.
In other markets, oil dropped more than 1 percent on Monday,
with Brent slipping to around $62 a barrel, depressed by a
stronger dollar and a rise in Libyan crude output.
Palm, soy and crude oil prices at 1028 GMT
Contract Month Last Change Low High Volume
MY PALM OIL MAR5 2381 +60.00 2355 2381 220
MY PALM OIL APR5 2373 +65.00 2339 2379 3899
MY PALM OIL MAY5 2373 +68.00 2335 2379 27548
CHINA PALM OLEIN MAY5 5164 +124.00 5100 5174 447282
CHINA SOYOIL MAY5 5740 +130.00 5672 5758 411866
CBOT SOY OIL MAY5 33.40 -0.10 32.99 33.50 8937
INDIA PALM OIL MAR5 466.00 -0.10 465.10 474.50 1905
INDIA SOYOIL APR5 598.40 +3.00 597.20 606.00 37815
NYMEX CRUDE APR5 49.10 -0.66 49.02 49.62 27369
Palm oil prices in Malaysian ringgit per tonne
CBOT soy oil in U.S. cents per pound
Dalian soy oil and RBD palm olein in Chinese yuan per tonne
India soy oil in Indian rupee per 10 kg
Crude in U.S. dollars per barrel
($1 = 3.6300 ringgit)
($1 = 6.2720 Chinese yuan renminbi)
($1 = 61.9700 Indian rupees)
- Reuters
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