Ahm'd Commodity Exchange to go live on Oct 26

Ahmedabad Commodity Exchange (ACE), the country's fifth national commodity bourse, will start trading operations on October 26 with five agricultural commodities, a top official of the exchange said today.

"We are ready with all the infrastructure. We will go live as a national commodity exchange on October 26 and trading in contracts will begin from October 27," ACE Chief Executive Officer Dilip Bhatia told PTI.

ACE is the first instance of a regional exchange being licensed to upgrade into a national multi commodity exchange. Kotak Mahindra group is the anchor investor in it.

"Initially, we will begin trade in five agri-commodities -- soyabean, soya oil, rapemustard seed, chana, castor seed," Bhatia said.

A few more commodities like sugar, bullion and metals will be added later after the exchange gets the approval from the commodity market regulator FMC, he added.

The country has four national level commodity exchanges -- National Multi-Commodity Exchange (NMCE), National Commodity and Derivatives Exchange (NCDEX), Multi-Commodity Exchange of India (MCX) and Indian Commodity Exchange Ltd.

The government has decided to cap the number of national commodity exchanges at eight to foster sustained growth of the commodity futures market.