JAKARTA, Jan 20: Malaysian crude palm oil futures finished 1.7 per cent lower on Tuesday, hit by falling crude oil and soyaoil prices, traders said.

Data released on Malaysian palm oil exports in the first 20 days of January failed to shore up palm prices despite coming within market expectations, they said.

The benchmark April contract on the Bursa Malaysia Derivatives Exchange closed down 32 ringgit, or 1.7pc, to 1,827 ringgit a ton ($506). Other traded contracts fell between 14 and 28 ringgit. Overall volume was at 14,133 lots of 25 tons each.

Palm oil, used in biscuits to biofuels, have climbed 37 per cent from an Oct. 28 low of 1,331 ringgit on falling stocks but has failed to breach the key 2,000 ringgit level due to weaker exports and volatile external markets.

Trade data was just within expectation. Certainly we are not going to see the whole month to be as good as last month, a trader at a Malaysian brokerage firm, adding that he is looking at whole month figure of 1.1-1.2 million tons.

The trader said the market had been pressured mainly by weakening crude oil and soyaoil prices, as well as falling equity markets.

In Indonesia, the world’s largest palm oil producer, the state marketing centre said it sold 4,000 tonnes of crude palm oil out of 5,000 tonnes it offered, at a top price of 6,170 rupiah ($) per kg, up from 6,128 rupiah per kg on Tuesday.

Producers in Medan -- home to Belawan port, Indonesia’s key palm oil export port -- sold palm oil at 6,100-6,205 rupiah per kg. .They did not hold a palm oil tender on Monday.

Meanwhile, refiners in Jakarta sold refined, bleached, deodorised (RBD) palm oil, used as cooking oil, at 6,750 rupiah per kg, against 6,700 rupiah per kg on Monday.

In the physical market, Malaysian palm oil for January and February deliveries was traded at 1,835-1,840 ringgit per ton in the southern region and at 1,835 ringgit a tonne in the central region.—Reuters