Turnover of comexes inches close to Rs 9 trn

Futures trading in the commodity exchanges reached a whopping Rs 8,97,816 crore till June-end in the current financial year on the back of more participation in the non-agricultural commodities counters.

"Since the government has put a restriction on new agricultural commodities till it decides the issue of impact of futures trading on prices, the business has shifted to non-farm counters," an analyst with a local commodity brokerage house said.

Releasing the fortnightly data of turnover, the Forward Markets Commission, the regulator for the commodity markets, said, "The value of trade during April-June period of this financial year is Rs 8,97,816.52 crore."

According to FMC, the turnover of three national-level and 20 regional exchanges during the second fortnight of last month declined by 12.62 per cent to Rs 1,31,754.09 crore from Rs 1,50,796.26 crore in June 1-15 this year. Trading at the leading commodity exchange, MCX, was hit in the second fortnight as its turnover dipped by about 12 per cent to Rs 97,897.36 crore from over Rs 1,00,000 crore in the previous fortnight.

At MCX, copper trading recorded a record Rs 22,622.61 crore, surpassing gold which stood at Rs 20,397.97 crore in the June 16-30 period. Other contracts that attracted major business were silver, crude oil, zinc, nickel, natural gas and aluminium.

The turnover at leading agri-commodity exchange NCDEX too slid to Rs 28,627 crore from Rs 33,501 crore in the fortnightly review period.

However, the trading at Ahmedabad-based national exchange, NMCE, improved in the second fortnight of June to Rs 671 crore from Rs 658 crore in the previous fortnight. Interestingly, the turnover of some of the regional commodity exchanges were higher than the value of trade at NMCE during June 16-30.

The turnover of 20 regional exchanges recorded at Rs 4,558.56 crore led by Indore-based National Board of Trade with Rs 2,894.08 crore and followed by Hapur's Chamber of Commerce which registered a business of Rs 876.52 crore in the fortnight.