March 21, 2022
KUALA LUMPUR – The Malaysian rubber market is expected to continue trading on cautious mode this week, driven by concern over the outlook of the global commodity markets, according to a dealer.
He said market operators are also expected to continue assessing the impact of the start of the US Federal Reserve rate hike cycle from last week.
Despite the positive natural rubber outlook in 2022 and upbeat United States manufacturing data, he said industry players have remained cautious over the ongoing Ukraine-Russia peace talks.
The Association of Natural Rubber Producing Countries (ANRPC) reported that the global outlook for the natural rubber market should stay positive this year.It said the world production is expected to grow by 1.9%, or 14.107 million tonnes, while the world consumption is expected to grow moderately at 1.2%, or 4.232 million tonnesthis year.
However, the ANRPC said the supply side would be heavily affected by the adverse climate, labour shortages in natural rubber producing countries amid the surge of Omicron cases around the globe and off-tapping season which may aggravate the supply tightness of raw material in the coming months.
On a weekly basis, the Malaysian Rubber Board’s (MRB) reference physical price for Standard Malaysian Rubber (SMR) 20 declined 24.0 sen to 710.5 sen a kg while latex-in-bulk eased 19.5 sen to 670.5 sen per kg.
At 5pm last Friday, MRB’s closing price for SMR 20 stood at 711.0 sen per kg, while latex-in-bulk was at 670.0 sen per kg. — Bernama