The turnover of commodity bourses from bullion trade has fallen sharply by nearly 20% to Rs 12.97 lakh crore in the first two months of this fiscal due to sluggish investors participation on bearish price outlook.
According to the data released by the commodity markets regulator, Forward Market Commission (FMC), the turnover of commodity exchanges from bullion trade declined to Rs 12,97,572 crore in the April-May period of 2012-13 against Rs 16,15,138 crore in the year-ago period.
The maximum of gold and silver is traded on MCX, the country's leading commodity bourse.
At the MCX platform, 2,000 tonnes of gold and over 1,27,000 tonnes of silver was traded in April-May 2013. At ICEX, 32 tonnes of gold and 1,738 tonnes of silver was traded.
Experts attributed the declining trend in business volume of gold and silver to lack of direction in the global market, especially the US, weak rupee and import duty hike.
"Bullion has not been doing well. There has been less participation as investors are not clear which way the prices might move, both in the global and domestic market," commodity brokerage firm SMC Wealth Management Managing Director D K Aggarwal said.
Investors are awaiting for direction for price movement to park their funds. They were hoping that the US might announce its third round of stimulus package that could boost bullion prices globally, he said.
In the domestic market, falling rupee and hike in the import duty on gold and silver kept investors away, he added.
Meanwhile, the rupee lost 21 paise to 55.15 against the US dollar in early trade on the Interbank Foreign Exchange market.
Gold became costlier in India with spot prices crossing Rs 30,000 mark on June 3 due to weak rupee.
In the futures market, gold prices for June delivery at MCX were quoted at Rs 29,198 per 10 grams on May 31.
There are five national and 15 regional commodity exchanges in the country. The total turnover of these exchanges grew marginally by 4% to Rs 26.90 lakh crore in the first two months of the current fiscal.
