KUALA LUMPUR: Palm oil futures pared some losses on Monday during the second half of trade, as official data showed lower-than-forecast inventory levels, but still ended lower after falling as much as 1 per cent.

The benchmark palm oil contract for January delivery on the Bursa Malaysia Derivatives Exchange was down 0.3pc at 2,034 ringgit ($485.91) a tonne at the end of the trading day, charting a fifth consecutive day of losses.

It earlier fell as much as 1.6pc to 2,008 ringgit in early trade, its lowest levels since September 2015. Trading volumes stood at 55,220 lots of 25 tonnes each at the close of trade. “Stocks came in much lower than we had forecast,” said a Singapore based futures trader, explaining why the market had reversed some of its losses in the second half of trade.

Published in Dawn, November 13th, 2018