Malaysian crude palm oil futures edged lower on Thursday but recouped most of the day's fall after an industry regulator released better-than-expected stocks data, traders said. The benchmark February contract on the Bursa Malaysia Derivatives Exchange settled down 5 ringgit, or 0.2 percent at 2,521 ringgit ($742.56) a tonne, coming off the day's low of 2,489 ringgit. Overall volume was 20,308 lots of 25 tonnes each.
"Stocks data is supportive, I would say but not bullish. December fundamentals are going to be supportive as well," said a trader at a Kuala Lumpur-based brokerage, adding that the market uptrend remains intact. Malaysia's November palm oil stocks dropped 2.02 percent to 1,934,613 tonnes from a revised 1,974,526 tonnes in October, Malaysian Palm Oil Board said on Thursday. November's fall compared with market estimates for a 2.8 percent rise to 2.03 million tonnes in a Reuters poll issued earlier this week.
Analysts have been bullish on a longer-term price outlook, with influential analysts James Fry and Dorab Mistry forecasting the palm oil price would go up to 3,000 ringgit next year assuming that stocks will decline. Some traders said that as the year end is approaching, funds may lock in profits while demand from key buyers may pick up ahead of the holidays. Cargo surveyors gave mixed estimates on palm oil exports for the first ten days of December.
Intertek Testing Services said on Thursday that exports of Malaysian palm oil products for December 1-10 rose 2.2 percent to 412,166 tonnes, from 403,302 tonnes shipped between November 1-10. But another surveyor, Societe Generale de Surveillance, said that exports fell 5.2 percent to 399,575 tonnes from 421,311 tonnes shipped between November 1-10.
INDONESIAN PALM TRADES: In Indonesia, the state marketing centre, based in Jakarta, did not sell any of the 6,000 tonnes of palm oil it offered in an auction due to low bids.
Producers in Medan, home to Indonesia's main palm oil export port of Belawan, sold palm oil at 7,050 rupiah per kg, compared with 7,229 rupiah a day earlier. Refiners in Jakarta offered refined, bleached, deodorised (RBD) palm oil, used as cooking oil, at 6,950-7,050 rupiah per kg, against 7,050-7,100 rupiah on Wednesday. In the Malaysian physical market, palm oil for December delivery was traded at 2,440 ringgit per tonne in the southern and central regions.