Palm oil on the European vegetable oils market continued its firm tone on Tuesday, tracking gains in Malaysian palm oil futures on positioning ahead of May 1-10 export data that is due on Wednesday. Asking prices for palm oil were between unchanged and $7.50 a tonne higher after Malaysian palm oil futures closed between nine and 50 ringgit per tonne up, as strong demand for the commodity and talk of improving exports data supported sentiment.
"Palm oil demand picked up ahead of Ramadan, which starts towards the end of this month, and dealers expect export data during the first 10 days of May to reflect that demand," one broker said. At 1630 GMT CBOT soyaoil futures were between 0.05 and 0.13 cents per lb higher, tracking firmer Chicago soyabean futures, but gains were limited by easier energy markets.