KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 13: Malaysian palm oil futures ended lower in a volatile trade on Friday with players getting increasingly nervous about the future due to rising output and talk of poor exports, traders said.

The benchmark third-month November futures fell 24 ringgit to 1,394 ringgit ($366.84) a ton after touching a high of 1,408 ringgit and a low of 1,389 ringgit.

Volume was heavy at 5,314 lots.

One Kuala Lumpur trader said exports could reach 375,000-400,000 tons in the first 15 days of September, down from 454,567 tons in August 1-15 because of sagging overseas demand.

Oilseeds harvests in some of the main consuming countries will also restrict demand in coming months, he added. Cargo surveyors ITS and SGS are scheduled to release September 1-15 palm oil exports data on Monday.

China will have its own soy crop and is likely to buy more soyoil ahead of the winter. India will also harvest its own oilseed crop, said the trader.

Sunseed crop in Ukraine looks good, which means that European countries will have their own edible oil supplies. Maybe we should cut prices to 1,300 ringgit to stimulate demand, he added.

The Malaysian Palm Oil Board has put August output at 1.12 million tons, up 10.5 per cent from July. It put end-August stocks at 1.09 million tons, up 15.88 per cent from July.

One freight broker said freight rates for the shipment of palm oil from Peninsular Malaysia and Sumatra in Indonesia to main consumers such as India, China and Europe had risen by up to $3 a ton this week because of steady demand.

Shipment bookings to India have reached around 280,000 tons so far this month, but we believe that most of the oil will be shipped from Indonesia and not from Malaysia, said the broker.

Traders said that Indonesia, the world’s second-largest palmoil producer after Malaysia, has intensified exports in the past few months because of the country’s rising domestic output.

Indonesia exported 658,448 tons of palm oil in August, up from around 500,000 tons in the previous months, said traders. It shipped 232,000 tons of palm oil in the first 10 days of September, more than Malaysia’s 227,686 tons, they said.

In trading of physical crude palm oil, the September/ October contract for the southern and central zones saw bids at 1,400 ringgit a ton against offers at 1,405 ringgit.

Deals were reported at 1,400 to 1,410 ringgit a ton for September (south and central).—Reuters