KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysian palm oil futures edged down at the midday break on Friday, in line to chart a fifth session of losses in six, tracking weakness in China's Dalian Commodity Exchange, traders said.
The benchmark palm oil contract for June delivery on the Bursa Malaysia Derivatives Exchange was down 0.6 percent at 2,107 ringgit ($516.30) a tonne at the midday break. It earlier fell as much as 0.9 percent to 2,100 ringgit, its lowest level since March 19.
The market was also down 2.8 percent on a weekly basis so far, and in line to chart a second consecutive month of declines. Prices of the edible oil have been weighed by expectations of rising production in March and current highs in inventory levels in Malaysia.
On a quarterly basis, palm is also down 0.7 percent so far. Malaysian palm oil inventories rose 1.3 percent to 3.05 million tonnes in February from a month earlier while production had declined 11.1 percent to 1.54 million tonnes. <MYPOMS-TPO><MYPOMP-CPOTT>
"Palm is down mirroring overnight weakness in rival oilseed," said a Kuala Lumpur futures trader, referring to soyoil's losses on the U.S. Chicago Board of Trade on Thursday.
Another trader added that palm prices were also weighed by losses in soyoil and palm olein on China's Dalian Commodity Exchange.
The Chicago May soybean oil contract fell 0.7 percent on Thursday, and was last slightly down 0.03 percent.
In other related oils, the May soyoil contract on the Dalian Commodity Exchange declined 0.9 percent while the Dalian May palm oil contract fell 1.6 percent.
Palm oil prices are affected by movements in soyoil, as they compete for a share in the global vegetable oil market.
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