Palm oil on the European vegetable oils market was offered mostly lower on Friday, tracking weakness in Malaysian palm oil because of a stronger ringgit while CBOT soyaoil also eased. A strong ringgit makes Malaysian palm oil more expensive for foreign buyers and could hamper export demand. At the same time the currency supports palm oil prices on the European cash market.
Asking prices for palm oil were mostly offered between unchanged and $10 a tonne down from Wednesday as a public holiday in most of Europe on Thursday kept the market closed. Malaysian palm oil futures closed between 31 and 52 ringgit a tonne lower.
"It was again a slow day with many players bridging from Ascension Day to the weekend," one broker said. CBOT soyaoil futures were between 0.02 and 0.3 cents per lb lower by 1630 GMT on follow-through technical selling and pressured by expectations that Brazil's record-large harvest will curb export demand for US soya. There were also concerns that wet weather in the Midwest could prompt farmers to switch some planned corn acreage to soyabeans.
EU rapeoil was offered between 6 euros and 7 euros a tonne lower, tracking weaker CBOT soyaoil futures and because of easier rapeseed futures, which followed the lower trend in Chicago soyabeans. Coconut oil was offered between flat and $15 a tonne up, but sellers failed to find buyers. Palmkernel oil was between $5 and $15 a tonne down, weighed down by lower palm oil futures and weak demand.