KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 11: Malaysian palm oil futures rebounds on Wednesday due to short covering but off the day’s highs as the volatile market waited for the official crop data for August, traders said.

The benchmark third-month November futures touched a low of 1,411 ringgit before short covering lifted prices to a high of 1,434. The contract closed at 1,430 ringgit ($376.32) a ton, up eight ringgit from Tuesday.

Overall volume was heavy at 4,238 lots.

There was some short covering, but I don’t see anything special about the market today. People are waiting for tomorrow’s data, one trader said.

The Malaysian Palm Oil Board (MPOB) is scheduled to release the official August palm oil output, end-month stocks and exports data at around 0430 GMT on Thursday.

In his final estimates, private forecaster Ivan Wong said Malaysia’s palm oil output in August was estimated at 1.09 million tons, up 7.5 per cent from July.

He put end-August stocks at 1.02 million tons, up from the official 942,121 tons at end-July. Exports in August were estimated at 905,000 tons, up from the official 883,335 tons in July.

In trading of physical crude palm oil, the September/ October contract for the southern and central zones saw bids at 1,440 ringgit a ton against offers at 1,445 ringgit.

Cargo surveyor SGS said Malaysia palm oil exports for September 1-10 stood at 227,686 tons, down from 248,592 tons for August 1-10. The market had expected the number to reach 260,000-280,000 tons.

Traders in India said the world’s largest edible oil buyer would likely import less soyaoil in coming months due to higher prices fixed by the government and the local soyabean harvest.

They said soyaoil purchases, mainly from Argentina, Brazil and the United States, are likely to fall by 15 to 20 per cent after the government fixed the base price at $542 a ton last week.—Reuters