Palm oil opens lower

Palm oil opens lower

LONDON (Reuters): News that Pakistan has suspended all foreign
currency transactions amid the world-wide outcry over its nuclear
tests hit opening palm oil prices in Europe yesterday.

Crude palm oil opened $15 to $7.50 lower with products down a
similar amount, but traders said the market is quiet ahead of the
holiday weekend in most of Europe.

Traders said that a curb on foreign currency trading would
mean that Pakistan would not easily be able to obtain U.S.
dollars and would not be able to pay for any new shipments of
palm oil from Malaysia. It not may even be unable to honor
letters of credit for earlier transactions.

Only a couple of early trades were reported when early June
olein fetched $670 and $665 a ton fob Malaysian ports.

All other sectors of the market were featureless at the
opening with coconut oil unchanged to $5 down while
Malaysian/Indonesian palmkernel oil was $35 up.