Palm oil falls to five-week low

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysian palm oil futures fell for a third straight session on Tuesday, to hit its lowest in five weeks.

Malaysian palm oil slips

The benchmark palm oil contract for July delivery on the Bursa Malaysia Derivatives Exchange slid 17 ringgit, or 0.41%, to 4,124 ringgit ($860.96) by 0403 GMT, its lowest since March 12.

Fundamentals

• Malaysia’s palm oil stocks at end-March fell 10.68% from the previous month to 1.71 million metric tons, the lowest in 10 months, as a surge in exports overshadowed output, according to Malaysian Palm Oil Board data.

• Crude palm oil production gained 10.57% to 1.39 million tons for the period, while exports ticked up 28.61% to 1.32 million tons, according to the data.

• Exports from Malaysia for April 1-15 rose 9.2% to 633,680 metric tons, from March 1-15, cargo surveyor Intertek Testing Services said. Another surveyor, Amspec Agri Malaysia, said exports rose 28.5% to 697,449 tons.

• Oil prices rose on Tuesday amid heightened tensions in the Middle East after Israel’s military chief said his country would respond to Iran’s weekend missile and drone attack.

• Weaker crude oil futures make palm a less attractive option for biodiesel feedstock.

• Dalian’s most-active soyoil contractfell 1.77%, while its palm oil contractdropped 2.3%. Soyoil prices on the Chicago Board of Trade were down 0.5%.

• Palm oil is affected by price movements in related oils as they compete for a share in the global vegetable oils market.

• Palm oil may extend loss into a range of 4,039-4,081 ringgit per metric ton, driven by a wave c, Reuters technical analyst Wang Tao said.