While the country?s stock exchange is touching new highs, the story of commodity exchanges is quite the opposite. A year-on-year comparison of fortnightly turnover of all commodity exchanges shows a widening gap between 2007-08 and 2006-07 (April-September).
The exchanges started on a positive note this fiscal, but lost way and the gap has been increasing consistently to reach Rs 1,27, 672.45 crore as on September 15, from a surplus of Rs 17,277.72 crore as on April 15.
In fact, the April headstart to the commodity exchanges? run this fiscal would not have come, but for the government announcement to ban futures trading in wheat, tur and urad. ?There is an increased turnover in April because when the government announced ban of futures trading in wheat, tur and urad, many open positions were closed and participants exited the markets,? said one commodity analyst.
The decision to ban the commodities has gone a long way in harming the turnover.
?There are a couple of reasons for the down turn on commodity exchanges. Firstly, the turnover of NCDEX has taken a hit and is only 1/7th or 1/8th of the total volume, compared to almost 1/3rd last year. Secondly, the interest of the investors has gone down in trading agri-commodities,? said Amar Singh, the head researcher of Angel Broking.
?We have been increasing the volume in non-agri commodities to counter the loss due to decline in investors? interest in agri-commodities. Frequent change in margins and position limits has had an adverse impact on agri-trading,? said Madan Sabnavis, chief economist of NCDEX.