Vegetable Oil Prices Mixed after Sharp Rally in Crude

Vegetable oil markets followed crude on Thursday, which was mostly unchanged overnight or slightly lower but rallied sharply during U.S. trading hours to settle almost 10 percent higher by the end of the U.S. equity session. As a result, palm oil futures ended the day narrowly mixed, while soybean oil futures settled sharply higher.

Soybean oil prices rose about one percent (July contract +27 basis points per pound). However, prices settled about 1/2 percent off the high of the day as profit-taking at the 5-day exponential, and 10-day moving averages limited the advance. The move, which was the first day futures settled higher this week, drove the most actively traded July contract back above the psychologically important 26-cent level. If prices move higher in the short term, it could signal a narrowing of the…