Malaysia palm oil futures were mixed on Monday due to a technical correction with the benchmark June contract down 1.9 percent after sharp gains last week. By the midday break, the benchmark June contract on Bursa Malaysia's derivatives exchange was down 48 ringgit at 2,546 ringgit ($799.6) a tonne. The April and May contracts were firmer, gaining 0.4 percent and 0.2 percent respectively.
Traded volume rose to 7,443 lots of 25 tonnes each from the usual 5,000 lots. The market will likely trade in a tight range in the immediate term, said a trader from a foreign brokerage, pegging the support and resistance levels for the crude palm oil futures at between 2,500 and 2,600 ringgit.
The trader said the weak export numbers for the first 10 days of April released on Saturday did not have any significant impact on the market because traders were wary of making any big moves before the stock data by industry regulator the Malaysian Palm Oil Board.
Exports of Malaysian palm oil products fell 37 percent in the first 10 days of April, cargo surveyor Intertek Testing Services said on Saturday. Another surveyor Societe Generale de Surveillance will release export data for the same period later on Monday.
Malaysia's March palm oil stocks dropped 7.5 percent to slightly more than 1.65 million tonnes, the MPOB said after the market closed for the early trading session on Monday. March's drop was broadly in line with market expectations that palm oil stocks in the world's No 2 producer of the vegetable oil likely fell 7.6 percent to 1.65 million tonnes.
Oil prices rose towards $86 a barrel in Asian hours, buoyed by a weaker US dollar and bullish data that showed Chinese crude imports jumping to their second-highest monthly level in March. The May soyoil delivery at the Chicago Board of Trade rose 0.4 percent in Asian hours, while the most traded September soyoil contract at China's Dalian Commodity Exchange inched up slightly.
"The firmer Dalian prices were in line with other overseas markets after positive USDA reports on Friday," a Shanghai-based analyst in Shanghai said. The US Agriculture Department (USDA) on Friday hiked its estimates of soybean crops from Brazil and Argentina, the world's No 2 and No 3 producers, but said strong demand from China will help consume the bumper crops.
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