Commodity exchanges turnover dipped by 7.32 per cent to Rs 18.49 lakh crore till May 15 of this fiscal due to sluggish trade in gold and silver futures, the Forward Markets Commission (FMC) said.

The turnover stood at Rs 19.95 lakh crore in the same period last year, the FMC said on its website.

Barring bullion, much of the business came from futures trading in agricultural commodities, metals and energy items.

According to the FMC data, bullion trade fell over 34 per cent to Rs 8,48,489 crore till May 15 of the 2012-13 fiscal against Rs 12,86,538 crore in the yea-ago period.

However, agricultural trade rose 50.23 per cent to Rs 2,60,887 crore from Rs 1,73,661 crore, while futures trading in metals like copper grew 41 per cent to Rs 4,07,707 crore from Rs 2,89,072 crore.

FMC said the turnover from energy items also rose 35 per cent to Rs 3,31,998 crore from Rs 2,45,841 crore.

At present, there are five national level commodity exchanges and 15 regional level bourses in the country.

In 2011-12 fiscal, the commodity exchanges had registered a business of Rs 181.26 lakh crore.

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