KUALA LUMPUR, July 3 (Xinhua) -- BMI Country Risk and Industry Research has maintained its forecast for Malaysia's crude palm oil (CPO) prices as ample supply to cap gains despite policy-driven support.

The Fitch Solutions research house said in a note on Tuesday that it maintained its average annual price forecast for Bursa Malaysia-listed CPO futures contracts in 2025 at 4,150 ringgit (981 U.S. dollars) per ton.

As of the market's closure on June 27, front-month CPO contracts settled at 3,986 ringgit per ton, bringing the year-to-date average to 4,360 ringgit per ton.

"We expect global production to reach 80.6 million tons in the 2025/26 season, representing a 2.4 percent year-on-year increase, facilitated by an expected 0.5 percent year-on-year increase in Malaysia, and a 3.3 percent increase in Indonesia," said the research house.

BMI also expects global palm oil consumption in the 2025/26 season to reach 78.3 million tons, representing a year-on-year increase of 1 percent.

"Despite only a marginal year-on-year increase in consumption, we expect the global production surplus to widen from 1.2 million tons in the 2024/25 season to 2.3 million tons in the 2025/26 season, which we anticipate will place a lid on global prices throughout the remainder of 2025 and into the first half of 2026," it said. (1 ringgit equals 0.24 U.S. dollars) ■