Malaysian palm oil futures edged up on Monday evening, having risen nearly 1 percent earlier in the day, tracking strength in related edible oils and charting a second straight session of gains. The benchmark palm oil contract for October delivery on the Bursa Malaysia Derivatives Exchange was up 0.5 percent at 2,206 ringgit ($541.08) a tonne at the close of trade. The market earlier rose as much as 0.9 percent to 2,215 ringgit.
Trading volumes stood at 31,538 lots of 25 tonnes each at the end of the trading day. "The market is seeing support from overnight US soyaoil as well as on strength in Dalian," said a Kuala Lumpur-based futures trader.
Gains in the ringgit however could cap further increases in palm, another trader added. The ringgit, palm's currency of trade, strengthened 0.1 percent to 4.0770 against the dollar on Monday evening after four previous days of losses.
A stronger ringgit usually makes the tropical oil more expensive for holders of foreign currencies. In other related oils, the Chicago December soyabean oil contract rose 0.9 percent in Friday's session, and was last up 0.3 percent on Monday.
Meanwhile, the September soyabean oil contract on China's Dalian Commodity Exchange rose 0.8 percent and the Dalian September palm oil contract was up 0.6 percent. Palm oil prices are influenced by the performance of other edible oils as they compete for a share in the global vegetable oils market.