Malayan Flour Sees Australian Wheat in Market in 2008

By Claire Leow

July 29 (Bloomberg) -- Palm oil futures in Malaysia dropped below 3,000 ringgit ($921) a metric ton for the first time in seven months.

Palm oil for October delivery fell as much as 1.4 percent to 2,958 ringgit on the Malaysia Derivatives Exchange, the lowest since Dec. 21. The contract was at 2,981 ringgit at 12:02 p.m. local time.

``It could drop to 2,800 ringgit soon,'' Ben Santoso, an analyst at DBSVickers Securities (Singapore), said by phone today. ``It depends on oil.''

Vegetable oils tend to track crude oil prices as they can used for making biofuels.

New York crude oil futures have declined 11 percent this month. Oil for September delivery last traded at $125.08 a barrel, up 0.3 percent from yesterday.

Soybean oil traded in Chicago has dropped 12 percent the past month and was at to 59.82 cents a pound in electronic trading at 12:02 a.m. in Singapore. Palm oil is a substitute for soybean oil.

To contact the reporters for this story: Claire Leow in Singapore at cleow@bloomberg.net;