Malaysian palm oil ends slightly down

Malaysian crude palm oil futures closed marginally lower on Thursday, as prices of rival soyaoil declined on the Chicago Board of Trade. Dealers said the market was awaiting comments from Dorab Mistry, a leading palm oil analyst, who is due to speak on Friday at an industry meeting on the sector's outlook.
"The decline was limited as everyone is waiting for comments from Dorab Mistry," said one dealer. The benchmark February contract on the Bursar Malaysia Derivative exchange finished down 3 ringgit at 1,850 ringgit ($522) per tonne. Most other traded months closed down between one and 28 ringgit. Overall traded volume was 11,880 lots of 25 tonnes each.
Mistry told Reuters on Thursday that India's 2006-2007 (November-October) palm oil imports should be sharply higher than the previous year, boosted by an expected duty cut. "Imports are definitely going to be sharply higher, we are expecting a duty cut as the government has put imports of vegetable oil under critical watch," Mistry, director of London-based Gordon International, said on the sidelines of an industry conference in Indonesia's resort island of Bali.
He also said the United States will import up to 30 percent more palm oil from Malaysia and Indonesia in 2007, and purchases by European nations are likely to grow by 25 percent.
The Chicago Board of Trade soyabean market dived to a two-week low Wednesday, falling on year-end profit taking, traders said. Commodity funds were liquidating their long positions in all the CBOT markets a trend seen since on Monday as open interest has fallen in corn, soyabean meal and soyabean oil over the past two sessions. December soyaoil closed 0.56 cent lower at 28.36 per lb and January was 0.56 weaker at 28.78 slipping below its 20-day moving average of 28.95 cents.
Soyaoil and palm oil compete for exports and their prices often move in step. In the physical palm oil market, December shipment was quoted at 1,830/1,840 ringgit a tonne.
Trades were done between 1,830 and 1,835 ringgit. Exports of Malaysian palm products for November fell 5 percent to 1,359,790 tonnes from 1,430,900 tonnes in October, cargo surveyor Society General de Surveillance said. Another cargo surveyor, Interlake Testing Services, said exports during the month fell 5.7 percent to 1,366,111 tonnes.