Malaysian palm oil price up for 4th day to 1-wk high

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysian palm oil futures rose to a one-week high on Wednesday, stretching gains into a fourth day as top grower Indonesia moved closer to laying on levies which may make its palm more expensive for importers. 
    The Southeast Asian country plans to impose a levy of
$50/tonne when the crude palm oil export tax is zero, where the
money gained be used to fund new biodiesel subsidies and
policies. The regulation will be implemented once approved by
President Joko Widodo. 
    "Once the levy is in place, free-on-board crude palm oil
prices will take a jump, so (futures) prices will be supported,"
said one palm trader with a foreign commodities brokerage in
Kuala Lumpur. 
    Market players say the levy will help boost confidence in
the key producer to carry out its ambitious biofuel plans and
soak up excess supplies of palm in the market. 
    "The levy is the precursor - it is seen as a first step
forward to the implementation of the local biodiesel programmes,
and that is the bullish factor right now," the Kuala
Lumpur-based trader added. 
    The benchmark June contract on the Bursa Malaysia
Derivatives Exchange touched a one-week high of 2,181 ringgit in
late trade, before settling at 2,161 ringgit ($584) a tonne by
the day's close, up 0.6 percent. 
    Total traded volume stood at 51,767 lots of 25 tonnes, above
the usual 35,000 lots.   
    
          
    Malaysia, the world's second-largest palm grower, will
remove its crude palm oil export tax for the month of May
against a 4.5 percent rate imposed in April, a government
circular showed late Tuesday.
    The decision could delay buying interest for the crude grade
to next month, traders said.
    Malaysian palm shipments for the first half of April fell 3
percent to between 470,058-477,295 tonnes compared with the same
period in March, according to cargo surveyors Intertek Testing
Services and Societe Generale de Surveillance.
  
    In vegetable oil markets, the U.S. soyoil May contract
 rose 0.4 percent in early Asian trade, while the most
active September soybean oil contract on the Dalian
Commodity Exchange gained 2.4 percent. 
    Brent crude oil prices rose above $59 a barrel on Wednesday
amid tension in the Middle East and signs of a dip in U.S.
production, but gains were capped by a report from the
International Energy Agency (IEA) indicating that supplies would
take longer to tighten than previously expected.    
  Palm, soy and crude oil prices at 1011 GMT
                                                                                                                             
  Contract        Month    Last   Change     Low    High  Volume
  MY PALM OIL      APR5       0    +0.00       0       0       0
  MY PALM OIL      MAY5    2172    +6.00    2172    2199    2343
  MY PALM OIL      JUN5    2161   +13.00    2152    2181   20257
  CHINA PALM OLEIN SEP5    4720   +62.00    4662    4734  747760
  CHINA SOYOIL     SEP5    5570  +128.00    5440    5588 1307738
  CBOT SOY OIL     MAY5   31.39    +0.10   31.24   31.65   11605
  INDIA PALM OIL   APR5  435.70    +0.10  435.50  438.60     548
  INDIA SOYOIL     APR5  603.80    +1.75  603.00  605.50    4095
  NYMEX CRUDE      MAY5   54.05    +0.76   53.39   54.25   33002
                                                                                                                             
  Palm oil prices in Malaysian ringgit per tonne
  CBOT soy oil in U.S. cents per pound
  Dalian soy oil and RBD palm olein in Chinese yuan per tonne
  India soy oil in Indian rupee per 10 kg
  Crude in U.S. dollars per barrel
 
 ($1 = 3.7030 Malaysian ringgit)    
 ($1 = 6.2052 Chinese yuan)
 ($1 = 62.41 Indian rupees)
- Reuters