July 13, 2002	Saturday	Jamadi-ul-Awwal 2, 1423

KUALA LUMPUR, July 12: Malaysian palm oil futures ended up on Friday after the release of market-friendly data for June but traders said the week ahead looked cloudy with little optimism on exports.

The benchmark third-month futures, September, closed off the day’s highs at 1,373 ringgit ($361) a ton, up 14 from Thursday. Volume was at 2,855 lots.

Traders put the contract’s immediate range at 1,350-1,380, seeing a bigger downside potential as exports had not been at their best.

Cargo surveyors Intertek Testing Services and Societe Generale de Surveillance are due to give their estimates for palm oil shipments in the first 15 days of July on Monday.

Traders said they doubted the data would be even half of the 876,036 tonnes officially recorded for June.

The market is quite directionless and we’ll have to wait for these export figures to see if we’ll actually have manageable stock levels this month, said a trader.

The market closed the week higher after the official Malaysian Palm Oil Board confirmed trade expectations that crude palm oil (CPO) output in June was only slightly higher than in previous months.

MPOB gave a 1.99 per cent growth in CPO production for June, against a rise of 7.0 per cent in May, 3.3 per cent in April, 15.32 per cent in March and 17.3 per cent in February.

It also put closing stocks for June at 910,116 tons, against 929,940 for May.

A lower output or closing stock in any month means lesser CPO carried forward into the next month, a positive factor for the market.

CPO’s July and August contracts saw bids at 1,380 ringgit in the southern as well as as central regions against sale offers at 1,385 ringgit.

Trade was reported at 1,385 in the morning and between 1,380 and 1377.50 at the close.—Reuters