Malaysian palm oil futures fell on profit-taking on Monday evening, snapping three previous sessions of gains, while a stronger ringgit currency and overnight losses in US soyaoil on the Chicago Board of Trade also weighed.
The benchmark palm oil contract for June delivery on the Bursa Malaysia Derivatives Exchange fell by 1.6 percent to 2,464 ringgit ($636.86) a tonne at the end of the trading day, its sharpest daily fall in five weeks.
Palm had hit a five-week high in the previous session after Malaysia announced it would extend tax exemptions on crude palm oil (CPO) exports to a fourth straight month in April.
Trading volumes stood at 38,146 lots of 25 tonnes each in the evening.
"We're seeing some profit-taking after palm's last session, which was overdone on the upside, and ahead of the Malaysian Palm Oil Board report due tomorrow," said one Kuala Lumpur-based futures trader.
The Malaysian industry regulator is scheduled to release official data on palm oil's March stockpiles, production and exports after 0430 GMT on Tuesday.
End-stocks in Malaysia are forecast to have declined by 8.6 percent from February to 2.27 million tonnes, while exports are seen rising to 19.3 percent month on month to 1.57 million tonnes, according to a Reuters poll.
Meanwhile, production is seen up 11.3 percent at 1.49 million tonnes in March.
The trader added that weaker soyaoil on the Chicago Board of Trade overnight and gains in the ringgit earlier on Monday also weakened palm oil prices.
A stronger ringgit, palm's currency of trade, typically makes the edible oil more expensive for foreign buyers. The ringgit strengthened as much as 0.2 percent against the dollar on Monday before easing by 0.03 percent in the evening.
In related oils, the Chicago Board of Trade's May soyabean oil contract fell by 0.8 percent on Friday and was last down 0.1 percent on Monday.
May soyabean oil on China's Dalian Commodity Exchange rose by 0.8 percent, while the Dalian May palm oil contract was up 0.3 percent.
Palm oil prices are affected by movements in rival edible oils competing for a share in the global vegetable oils market.
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