VEGOILS-Palm eases from 5-month peak on stronger ringgit

* Market up 3.1 pct on the week so far

* Stronger demand to support long-term palm uptrend - trader

* Palm faces resistance at 2,304 rgt/T - Technicals

By Emily Chow

KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 25 (Reuters) - Malaysian palm oil futures

on Friday dropped from a five-month high hit in the previous

session as a stronger ringgit weighed on market.

A stronger ringgit, palm's currency of trade, usually makes

the edible oil more expensive for foreign buyers. The ringgit

strengthened 0.2 percent against the dollar at 4.1340 around

noon on Friday.

The benchmark palm oil contract for April delivery

on the Bursa Malaysia Derivatives Exchange was down 0.1 percent

at 2,295 ringgit ($555.15) a tonne at the midday break, but was

up 3.1 percent so far this week.

Trading volumes stood at 6,725 lots of 25 tonnes each at

noon. (1FCPO-TOT)

"The market is reacting towards the stronger ringgit," said

a Kuala Lumpur-based futures trader, however, adding that the

market was overall bullish on rising demand.

"Demand is strong so stocks will drop, though, they will

still be relatively high."

Another trader estimated that gains in Malaysian exports in

January will be driven by Indian demand for palm olein. "The

palm market is still on an overall uptrend," he said.

India, the world's largest importer of edible oils, said

earlier this month it would lower the duty on crude palm oil

imports to 40 percent from 44 percent, while a tax on refined

oils was trimmed to 50 percent from 54 percent.

Malaysian shipments of refined palm oil, however, will be

taxed at 45 percent compared with 54 percent earlier.

In other related oils, the Chicago March soybean oil

contract rose as much as 0.2 percent, while the May

soybean oil contract on the Dalian Commodity Exchange

climbed up to 0.2 percent.

Meanwhile, the Dalian January palm oil contract

climbed 0.1 percent.

Palm oil prices are affected by movements in soyoil rates,

as they compete for a share in the global vegetable oil market.

Palm oil faces a strong resistance at 2,304 ringgit per

tonne, a break above which could lead to a gain into the range

of 2,322-2,351 ringgit, said Wang Tao, a Reuters market analyst

for commodities and energy technicals.

Palm, soy and crude oil prices at 0504 GMT:

Contract Month Last Change Low High Volume

MY PALM OIL FEB9 2187 -13.00 2186 2194 100

MY PALM OIL MAR9 2261 -6.00 2255 2265 628

MY PALM OIL APR9 2295 -2.00 2288 2302 3405

CHINA PALM OLEIN MAY9 4776 +6.00 4754 4786 281052

CHINA SOYOIL MAY9 5698 +10.00 5662 5704 264368

CBOT SOY OIL MAR9 29.56 +0.05 29.47 29.64 2464

INDIA PALM OIL JAN9 557.00 +1.00 555.80 557.9 67

INDIA SOYOIL FEB9 765.15 +2.90 763.05 765.5 1100

NYMEX CRUDE MAR9 53.79 +0.66 53.03 53.94 46074

Palm oil prices in Malaysian ringgit per tonne

CBOT soy oil in U.S. cents per pound

Dalian soy oil and RBD palm olein in Chinese yuan per tonne

India soy oil in Indian rupee per 10 kg

Crude in U.S. dollars per barrel

($1 = 4.1340 ringgit)

($1 = 71.0700 Indian rupees)

($1 = 6.7743 Chinese yuan)

(Reporting by Emily Chow; Editing by Sherry Jacob-Phillips)