Highlights

• India cut the all-in import duty on crude palm oil and crude soyoil to 11% from 16.5% on 24 September, and on crude sunflower oil to 5.5%. At August's prices, palm oil's duty-paid discount to sunflower oil narrowed by US$95 per tonne, while its discount to soyoil barely changed.
   
• Sunflower oil cannot make full use of its new advantage this quarter. India's sunflower oil imports fell to 103,000 tonnes in September, the lowest since Apr 22, while palm oil imports rose to a seven-month high of 810,000 tonnes.
   
• We estimate India's port and pipeline stocks at 2.0m tonnes on 1 October, or 40 days of offtake, and Malaysian palm oil stocks at a record 3.3m tonnes at end-September. Maintain OVERWEIGHT.
   

Analysis

• The duty cut favours sunflower oil on paper. Including the agriculture infrastructure cess and social welfare surcharge, the all-in duty is now 11% on crude palm oil and soyoil and 5.5% on crude sunflower oil. Based on the August average cost, insurance and freight (CIF) prices from the Solvent Extractors' Association of India (SEA), the duty-paid cost of crude sunflower oil falls by US$165 per tonne, against US$69 for crude palm. In August, crude palm oil landed only US$30 per tonne below crude soyoil, and soyoil imports reached a record 628,736 tonnes.
   
• Ports remain the bottleneck for sunflower oil. Ukraine shipped 131,000 tonnes of sunflower oil in 1-15 September, 62% of its normal pace, mostly by Danube barge, rail and road. Port access remains an issue, with Ukraine's daily agricultural shipments down to about 48,000 tonnes in late-September from 144,000 tonnes earlier in the month. Exporters at the Globoil conference in Mumbai expect Ukraine to ship about 300,000 tonnes of sunflower oil a month from October to March, half the usual pace, and Russian exports to fall 25-38% after Russia nearly doubled its export duty in September.
   
• Palm oil is filling the gap through the festive season. Dealers estimate India's September palm oil imports rose 3.5% mom to 810,000 tonnes, while soyoil eased 4.6% to 600,000 tonnes and sunflower oil fell 36% to 103,000 tonnes. Palm oil's share of edible oil imports rose to 54% from 47% in July, for a 3Q26 average of 50%. According to Patanjali Foods, refiners bought over 200,000 tonnes of crude palm oil in the week after the duty cut, with distributor inventories running low. Diwali falls on 8 November, against 20 October last year, which extends festive buying into early-November. We expect palm oil to hold above 50% of India's edible oil imports through November.