21/05/2008 (The News International, PakistanKuala Lumpur - Malaysian crude palm oil futures slipped on Tuesday as a lower-than-expected increase in exports and expectations of rising vegetable oil supplies weighed on the market. Dealers said a decision by Argentine farm groups to end a two-week strike over soy export taxes raised hopes of more shipments from the world’s number 3 soy supplier.

The benchmark August contract on the Bursa Malaysia Derivatives Exchange finished down 16 ringgit, or 0.45 per cent, at 3,554 ringgit per tonne. “Sentiment is weak because Argentine farmers are ending their strike, which will certainly ease pressure on supplies,” said a trader with a leading plantation company.

Other traded months fell between 5 and 28 ringgit. Overall trade dropped to 3,184 lots of 25 tonnes each from around 10,000 lots that change hands on a routine trading day. Exports of Malaysian palm oil products for May 1-20 rose 6 per cent to 830,873 tonnes from 782,609 tonnes shipped between April 1 and 20, cargo surveyor Intertek Testing Services said on Tuesday.

“The market was expecting exports to be higher than 900,000 tonnes, it is disappointing to see exports slowing down,” the plantation company trader said.

Another cargo surveyor, Societe Generale de Surveillance, said exports during the period fell 1.5 per cent to 849,767tonnes. In Malaysia’s physical market, crude palm oil for May shipment in the southern region was quoted at 3,550/3,570 ringgit. Trades were done at 3,550 ringgit a tonne.