The exchange has currently launched February, March, April and May 2017 contracts in Castor Seed, with 10 MT as the trading unit and Deesa (Gujarat) as the basis centre. Besides, in order to cater to the demand of a wide and diverse participants' group, MCX has decided to levy a flat transaction charge of 50 paise per one lakh rupees of transaction, the lowest in any commodity levied by the Exchange.
The response to this new contract has been quite satisfactory with traded volumes and Open Interest clocking 6050 tons and 1300 tons respectively, till the time of going to the Press.
India is the leader in global Castor Seed production and the country dominates international Castor Oil trade, meeting more than 80% of global demand of castor oil. India's export of Castor oil and derivatives are estimated to be over Rs.3,000 crores per annum, with indispensable usage in several industries like cosmetics, surface coatings, toiletries, pharmaceuticals, perfumes, soaps, lubricating formulations and medicines. By also meeting the hedging requirements of castor oil exporters and those connected to its exports, MCX Castor Seed Futures would fill in a critical gap in India's agri exports, playing its part in the Government's Make in India initiative.
Mr. Mrugank Paranjape, MD and CEO, MCX said, The decision to launch Castor Seed futures contracts was made to cater to the need of the stakeholders of Castor Seed, particularly those from the physical market of this crop, for a reliable instrument for price discovery and risk management. With India dominating the global castor oil trade and rising volumes of production of Castor Seeds commensurate with an increasing trend in exports of its extract, there was a need felt for an effective instrument for hedging and appropriate price discovery, which the MCX Castor Seeds futures would address. Given the proven soundness of our Risk Management System and robustness of MCX's technology backbone, we are confident that all stakeholders of Castor Seed would find hedging their price risks on the MCX platform a superior economic proposition.
Mr. Atul Chaturvedi, President, Solvent Extractors Association said, We are very glad that SEBI has permitted Commodity Exchanges to launch contract in Castor Seed futures, which we have been looking forward to, especially after futures contract in this commodity became unavailable since last year. Businesses like ours are significantly exposed to castor oil price movements and our bottomlines are often adversely affected by the uncertainty and volatility of its prices.
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