The turnover of commodity bourses has declined to Rs 136.51 lakh crore till January 15 of the current fiscal due to poor volumes in bullion trade, according to the Forward Markets Commission (FMC).
There are 21 commodity bourses in the country. The cumulative turnover of these exchanges stood at Rs 144.31 lakh crore in the same period last year, the FMC said in a report.
Bullion trade has come under pressure due to price volatility and the recent hike in import duty to 6 per cent to bring down the high current account deficit.
The trading sentiment was affected on reports of imposition of transaction tax on bullion trade, experts said.
According to the FMC data, turnover from bullion fell 24.56 per cent to Rs 63.21 lakh crore during April-January 15 of the current fiscal from Rs 83.78 lakh crore in the same period last year.
Barring gold and silver, performance of other commodities like agricultural items, energy and metal showed a marked improvement.
While the turnover from energy items increased 30 per cent to Rs 29.86 lakh crore from Rs 22.97 lakh crore, that from metals jumped 18 per cent to Rs 25.49 lakh crore from Rs 21.62 lakh crore.
Similarly, the turnover from agricultural items increased 13 per cent to Rs 17.95 lakh crore during April-January 15 of 2012-13 financial year from Rs 15.91 lakh crore in the same period last year.
Out of 21 commodity bourses, MCX, NCDEX, NMCE, ICEX and ACE are national level exchanges, while the rest operate at regional level.