RBI approved Indian Lead Company's application a week ago. Apart from this, three other private sector companies which have been granted approval are Birla Copper, Sterlite Industries and SWIL (Shalimar Wire Industries). MMTC is due to start hedging operations in nickel in about 10-15 days.

The entry in the field of hedging is designed to act as an insurance against possible losses due to price fluctuations on the LME.

MMTC has already routed its application through its authorised dealer (bank) and signed agreements with its brokers as per the norms laid down by RBI. Authorised dealers will monitor hedging operations.

Remittances of payments, either from the broker to the corporate or vice-versa, will be cleared by banks. MMTC has chosen HDFCas its authorised dealer, while Birla Copper has named Standard Chartered Bank.

To begin with, hedging will be confined to non-ferrous metals, besides precious metals like gold and silver. Since the de-canalisation of all non-ferrous metals in 1991-92 in the wake of the reforms, MMTC has been importing these in competition with private parties.

MMTC has forayed into new areas of business on the import side to shore up its turnover. It is importing wheat for roller flour mills, copper concentrate for another public sector enterprise, Hindustan Copper Ltd, steam coal for thermal power stations, metallurgical coke for pig iron plants besides, kerosene and furnace oil and silk.

According to MMTC sources, MMTC will be importing roughly 1.5 million tonnes of coking coal for its coke oven Konarak Mecoke project with an annual capacity of 8 lakh tonnes of coke.

Imports of copper concentrate on behalf of HCL became possible after MMTC bagged a tender floated by the former. With this, MMTC's import businesswill swell its turnover by more than Rs 100 crore during the current fiscal.

Sources said MMTC's gold import business remains unaffected due to large domestic demand. This is notwithstanding the recent hike in the import duty on the yellow metal from Rs 250 to Rs 400 per 10 gms. Its gold import is expected to cross the 50-tonne mark during the current fiscal.