KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysian palm oil futures fell in Friday evening trade, easing from a two-week high hit in the previous session, on pressure from a stronger ringgit.

The ringgit, palm’s currency of trade, firmed by 0.05 per cent to 4.0380 against the dollar. A stronger local currency typically makes palm oil more expensive for holders of foreign currencies.

The benchmark palm oil contract for September delivery on the Bursa Malaysia Derivatives Exchange was down 0.7pc at 2,326 ringgit ($576.03) a tonne at the close of trade, snapping two days of gains. It is up 1.8pc for the week but remained 4.2pc down and has shed 7.1pc since the start of the year. Trading volumes stood at 38,254 lots of 25 tonnes each at the end of the trading day.

Published in Dawn, June 30th, 2018