Malaysia tin rebounds
Malaysia's spot tin rebounded on Friday to end up 33cents at a new six-month high of 21.23 ringgit ($5.6) a kg, following active European short covering and a bullish London market. "All metals, especially copper, were up in London so, there was strong buying in the local market," a dealer said. Dealers noted an opening bid of 174 against offers of 62. Final turnover was 74, down from 90 on last Thursday. European buyers, facing a shortage, were still buying aggressively in Kuala Lumpur, dealers said. "The buying is mainly from Europeans because they are short of tin," a dealer said. He said the upward trend is expected to continue next week, on the back of a surge in copper prices. "It all depends on copper. But I think the resistance may be at 21.50," he said. The local price differential over LME widened to $110 a tonne premium from $60 previously.

Taiwan gold imports surge 137%
Taiwan's imports of gold bars and coins totalled 8.95 tonnes in April, the finance ministry said on Friday, a 137 per cent surge compared to April 1998, that caughtdealers by surprise. Cumulative gold imports over the first four months totalled 26.745 tonnes, down 3.69 per cent from the same 1998 period, the ministry said in a statement. Gold dealers attributed the April rise to a surge in demand triggered by low gold prices, active jewellery store promotions for Mother's Day on May 9 and rising industrial demand as a slowdown in economic growth bottoms out. "Such a strong rise is a surprise," said Yang Tien-li, chief dealer at the state-run Central Trust of China.

`Japan can defer May crude cut'
Kuwait has told Japanese customers they can defer a planned 4.56 per cent additional cut in May crude supplies by applying the May reduction to supplies for later months, industry sources said on Friday. The move, while leaving the ultimate amount of supply cuts unchanged, would allow buyers to adjust the timing of the reductions to smooth out potential logistical problems. The oil producer's notice last week that it would make an additional cut of 4.56 per cent insupplies, applied to the volume remaining after a previously announced 7.25 per cent cut, caused some disgruntlement among buyers, many of whom had already finalised their shipping schedules for May. Industry sources said Kuwait offered two options for applying the cuts to later months. One option would defer the extra cut to June, in which case May's cut would remain at the original 7.25 per cent.

Asia sugar premiums up
Thai raw sugar premiums were stronger on Friday following substantial orders from the Philippines, but the momentum was seen as temporary due to prospects for abundant supply, traders said. "Thai premiums are near their peak, as supplies of Brazilian sugar and sugar from other origins will come into the market soon," said a trader at a major Japanese trading house. The current premium levels should last no more than about 10 more days, traders said. Philippines is expected to complete orders to buy 300,000 tonnes of raw sugar from Thailand, Australia and South America in the nextfew days after private companies get import licences. In Japan, traders said refiners were eyeing shipments for July and beyond, when sugar would become available.