Palm Oil Little Changed in Malaysia Amid Speculation Supplies Set to Gain

(Bloomberg) -- Palm oil futures in Malaysia, the
benchmark for the commodity, were little changed near a five-
week high amid speculation the price may decline in the second
half of the year as supplies of the vegetable oil increase.

There's ``potential for weaker crude palm oil prices,''
analyst Andreas Bokkenheuser of PT UBS Securities Indonesia said
today from Jakarta. ``The majority of total-year production
occurs in the second half.''


Read more at Bloomberg Commodities News

UPDATE 1-Shangri-La raises $662 mln for China hotel expansion

(Reuters) - HONG KONG, July 4 - Shangri-La Asia Ltd. ,
the hotel arm of Malaysia's Kuok Group, plans to raise at least
HK$5.17 billion via a rights issue to pay back
debt and fund expansion plans in China's booming hotel arena.




The move by the hotel chain -- named after the mythical
utopia made famous by British author James Hilton -- comes as
deal action in major hotel chains heats up.


Read more at Reuters.com Mergers News

Malaysia's Lee Offers Quarter-Acre Estate Plots to Lure Oil Palm Investors

(Bloomberg) -- Malaysian millionaire Lee Kim Yew
plans to sell investors thousands of 1/4-acre plots of oil palm
plantation offering guaranteed returns for three years, the
first venture of its kind in the Southeast Asian country.

Lee is offering half of a 10,000 acre estate in Kelantan at
5,000 ringgit ($1,450) a plot, potentially raising 100 million
ringgit. For three years, as trees mature, investors will
receive a fixed return of 8 percent, Lee said in an interview.
After that, income depends on the commodity's price.


Read more at Bloomberg Emerging Markets News

Malaysia Debt Holdings of Foreign Investors Increase 24 Percent in April

(Bloomberg) -- Foreign investors increased their
holdings of Malaysian debt by 24 percent in April, Bank Negara
Malaysia said.

They raised total holdings to 55.3 billion ringgit ($16
billion) from 44.6 billion ringgit in March, according to Bank
Negara's Web site. The central bank releases the statistics with
a two-month lag.


Read more at Bloomberg Bonds News

MISC, LNG Carrier, Postpones $750 Million Bond Sale on `Market Volatility'

(Bloomberg) -- MISC Bhd., the world's biggest owner
of liquefied natural gas tankers, postponed a planned dollar-
denominated bond sale because of fluctuations in debt yields
sparked by losses linked to U.S. subprime mortgages.

Kuala Lumpur-based MISC, a unit of Malaysian state-owned oil
company Petroliam Nasional Bhd., hired Citigroup Inc. and
Deutsche Bank AG to sell $750 million of 10-year bonds, an e-mail
sent to investors earlier this week showed.


Read more at Bloomberg Emerging Markets News

Malaysian Palm Oil Exports Drop 11 Percent This Month, Intertek Estimates

(Bloomberg) -- Malaysia's palm oil exports fell 11
percent from June 1 to June 25 compared with the same period a
month earlier, according to an estimate from Intertek, an
independent cargo surveyor.

A total of 821,500 metric tons of bulk shipments through
Malaysian sea ports were tracked in the first 25 days of the
month, Intertek Malaysia said in a report today. Malaysia
exported 918,738 tons in the same period last month, the
surveyor said.


Read more at Bloomberg Commodities News

Malaysian Oil Pipeline Owner Plans Stake Sale to Middle Eastern Investors

(Bloomberg) -- Trans-Peninsula Petroleum Sdn., the
developer of a $7 billion pipeline across Malaysia, is in talks
to sell some of the venture to Middle Eastern oil producers to
help them bypass one of the world's busiest trade routes.

Overseas oil companies may own 70 percent and local
investors 30 percent, Syed Izhar, deputy chairman of Trans-
Peninsula, said in a telephone interview in Kuala Lumpur. Foreign
investors will have a bigger stake because they will be the
pipeline's users, he said.


Read more at Bloomberg Energy News

Malaysia Palm Oil Exports Decline 15 Percent This Month, Intertek Reports

(Bloomberg) -- Malaysia's palm oil exports fell 15
percent from June 1 to June 20 compared with the same period a
month earlier, according to estimates by independent cargo
surveyor Intertek.

A total of 661,626 metric tons of bulk palm oil shipments
through Malaysian sea ports were tracked in the first 20 days of
the month, Intertek Malaysia said in a report issued today.
Malaysia exported a total of 775,979 tons of palm oil in the same
period last month, the surveyor said.


Read more at Bloomberg Commodities News

Malaysian Palm Oil Futures Open Interest Climbs to Record as Trade Surges

(Bloomberg) -- The number of outstanding palm oil
futures contracts on the Malaysia Derivatives Exchange reached a
record last week after trading volume in the world's most-traded
vegetable oil climbed to a new high.

Open interest, or contracts that have not been closed, on
the Bursa Malaysia Derivatives Exchange Bhd. totaled 101,536
contracts of 25 metric tons each on June 8, and 101,525 units on
June 11, the exchange said in a faxed statement.


Read more at Bloomberg Commodities News

Malaysian Ringgit Drops on Concern Fund Outflows to Continue; Bonds Slide

(Bloomberg) -- Malaysia's ringgit fell to a more than
seven-week low on concern local companies will sell the currency
to invest overseas. Government bonds slumped.

The ringgit headed for the biggest three-day drop since May
2006 after a trade ministry report on June 4 showed exports rose
less than expected. Tanjong Plc, a Malaysian power generation
group, on May 28 agreed to pay $493 million for Globeleq Ltd. to
acquire power plants in Eqypt, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.


Read more at Bloomberg Currencies News

Malaysia Palm Oil Gains For Third Day to Record on Chinese, Indian Demand

(Bloomberg) -- Palm oil futures in Malaysia advanced
for a third day to a record on signs of sustained demand from
China and India, the biggest consumers of the vegetable oil.

Malaysian exports of palm oil to China for the first five
months of the year rose 27 percent over the year-earlier period,
taking China's share of exports to 29 percent from 22 percent in
the same period last year, data from cargo surveyor Societe
Generale de Surveillance showed on May 31.


Read more at Bloomberg Commodities News

Malaysian Ringgit Has Biggest Two-Day Drop Since December as Exports Slow

(Bloomberg) -- Malaysia's ringgit had the biggest
two-day drop since December on speculation the central bank will
want a weaker currency to boost growth in exports.

The ringgit declined 0.3 percent yesterday, the most in more
than two months, as a government report showed exports in April
grew at less than a quarter of the pace projected by economists.
Expansion in Asia's third-largest economy slowed in the first
quarter to the least since the three months ended September 2005,
which may weigh on April industrial production numbers.


Read more at Bloomberg Currencies News

Parametric's Stein Uses Homegrown Strategy for Emerging Markets Returns

(Bloomberg) -- In 1994, Seattle-based Parametric
Portfolio Associates set out to create a strategy for investing
in emerging markets that would smooth out the price swings of
markets such as Brazil or Malaysia.

As a way to improve returns over the long term, it's on the
right track. Parametric's $1 billion Eaton Vance Tax-Managed
Emerging Markets Fund returned 33 percent annually on average for
the five years ended on May 29. That made it the third-best
performer among the 100 U.S.-based funds investing in emerging-
market stocks, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.


Read more at Bloomberg Exclusive News

Tanjong to Buy Globeleq for $493 Million to Gain Power Generation Assets

(Bloomberg) -- Tanjong Plc, a Malaysian power
generation and betting group, agreed to buy Globeleq Ltd. for
$493 million, gaining generation plants in Egypt, Bangladesh,
Pakistan and Sri Lanka.

Tanjong will purchase Globeleq from CDC Globeleq Holdings
Ltd. in cash, the Kuala Lumpur-based company said in a statement
today. Tanjong shares were halted for the announcement.


Read more at Bloomberg Emerging Markets News

Malaysia's EON Capital stake sale talks stall-paper

(Reuters) - "They've stopped negotiations at this point of time. It's a
pricing issue," the Business Times quoted a source familiar
with the talks as saying. It is believed DRB, the single
largest shareholder in Malaysia's seventh-ranked lender EON
Capital, was looking to sell its stake at 9-10 ringgit a share,
the paper said.




EON Capital shares closed at 6.80 ringgit on Friday.


Read more at Reuters.com Mergers News

Malaysia's Cagamas to Sell $177 Million of Securities Backed by Loans

(Bloomberg) -- Cagamas Bhd., Malaysia's biggest buyer
of home mortgages, plans to sell 600 million ringgit ($177
million) of securities backed by loans to small and medium-sized
businesses, the company said.

The firm will sell within a month so-called credit-linked
notes maturing in five years, the company said in a statement
today. Aseambankers Malaysia Bhd. and Citibank Bhd. are advising
and arranging the transaction.


Read more at Bloomberg Bonds News

Malaysian Ringgit at Highest Since 1998 on Central Bank's Policy Comment

(Bloomberg) -- Malaysia's ringgit held at its
strongest since February 1998 after the central bank said China's
new yuan trading band won't prompt changes to its own policy.

The ringgit yesterday extended a nine-week rally to the
strongest since February 1998 after China widened the yuan's daily
trading band. Economic and currency policies in China and Malaysia
are independent of each other, Bank Negara Malaysia Governor Zeti
Akhtar Aziz said late yesterday.


Read more at Bloomberg Currencies News