Malaysian palm oil ends higher

Reuters, Kuala Lumpur

Malaysian crude palm oil futures firmed across the board on Friday due to gains in CBOT soybean electronic trading and prospects of good exports and falling stocks in November, traders said.

"People ride on gains in CBOT electronic trading. The good fundamentals are there and the market may touch 1,200 ringgit next week," said one trader in Kuala Lumpur.

At the close, the benchmark third-month February futures rose 24 ringgit at 1,181 ringgit (US$310.79) a ton after trading as high as 1,191, just below key resistance of 1,200 ringgit.

Volume was extremely heavy at 4,007 lots.

Influential private forecaster Ivan Wong forecast end-November stocks at 1.30 million to 1.31 million tons, down from 1.34 million tons at the end of October.

Wong put November palm oil exports at 935,000 to 940,000 tons against 899,000 tons in October.

Some traders have expected November exports to reach between 975,000 and one million tons because of good demand from major buyers, such as India, China and Pakistan.

On Monday, cargo surveyors ITS and SGS are scheduled to release the export figures for the first 25 days of November.

One trader said India's palm oil imports from Malaysia and Indonesia would be steady at around 350,000 tons in November and December each, up from a normal 250,000 tons because of tight soyoil supplies.

"India will keep buying more palm oil until next March because South American soyoil from the new harvest will only start reaching the market in April," said the trader.