March 11, 2003	Tuesday	Muharram 7, 1424

KUALA LUMPUR, March 10: Malaysia’s palm oil futures fell across the board on Monday due to heavy liqudation after a main cargo surveyor failed to provide much-needed direction to the volatile market, traders said.

Societe Generale de Surveillance Malaysia (SGS) said it could not issue March 1-10 palm oil exports data on Monday because of technical problems.

Instead, the surveyor would move on with the exports numbers for March 1-15 which it would release next Monday, SGS said in a statement.

At the close, benchmark May futures fell 37 ringgit at 1,491 ringgit ($392.37) a ton after trading as low as 1,487 ringgit. The contract had touched a high of 1,534 ringgit.

Overall volume was heavy at 8,538 lots.

In the physical market, sellers offered the March/April contract at 1,525 ringgit a ton against bids of 1,520 ringgit for southern region.

Deals were done at 1,520 ringgit a ton.

March/April contract (central) was offered at 1,525 ringgit a ton against bids of 1,515 ringgit. No deals were done. —Reuters