By Mei Mei Chu
KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) -Malaysia’s palm oil end-stocks for November beat market surveys with a smaller-than-expected decline as the rise in exports came in lower than estimates, data from the nation’s palm oil board showed on Friday.
Production fell to a four-month low and stockpiles eased 0.96% from October to 1.82 million tonnes, according to Malaysian Palm Oil Board (MPOB) data.
“This is a shock to the market as the average trade guess was in the range of 1.72-1.78 million tonnes,” said Anilkumar Bagani, research head of Mumbai-based vegetable oils broker Sunvin Group.
Crude palm oil production at the world’s second-largest producer shrank 5.3% to 1.63 million tonnes, more than anticipated and hitting its lowest since July.
Exports rose 3.3% to 1.47 million tonnes, much lower than cargo surveyors’ estimate of an 8% to 14% jump.
This is because MPOB data excludes shipments of used cooking oil, which saw a large volume of flows to the European Union in the cargo surveyors’ data, said Sathia Varqa, co-founder of Singapore-based Palm Oil Analytics.
For December, production may continue to see a decline of around 7%, said Paramalingam Supramaniam, director at Selangor-based brokerage Pelindung Bestari. “Thus all eyes will be on demand, especially in the first quarter of 2022.”
Following is a breakdown of the MPOB figures and Reuters estimates for November (volumes in tonnes) [PALM/POLL]:
Nov 2021 Nov 2021 poll Oct 2021* Nov 2020
Output 1,634,932 1,743,095 1,725,837 1,491,551
Stocks 1,816,879 1,769,682 1,834,568 1,561,758
Exports 1,467,518 1,587,000 1,420,574 1,303,271
Imports 97,092 60,000 50,450 112,663
*indicates revised figures by the Malaysian Palm Oil Board
(Reporting by Mei Mei Chu; Editing by Christopher Cushing and Devika Syamnath)
