FMC suspends non-agri trading on Saturdays

FMC directs comexes to submit compliance report in four days ie by September 23

The Forward Markets Commission (FMC) has decided to suspend trading in non-agricultural commodities on Saturdays with immediate effect due to the absence of global reference for determining price movement in domestic exchanges.

Based on the feedback from exchanges, their members and physical markets participants, the Commission has decided that all the commodities exchanges shall keep their trading platform closed for non-agricultural commodities futures on Saturday with immediate effect, the FMC said in a statement.

According to the statement, comexes opted to remain closed on Saturday due to maintenance of record, housekeeping, attend to compliance matters etc.

However, trading in futures of agricultural commodities will continue on Saturdays as per the existing trading hours for the time being and the matter shall be reviewed after three months.

The FMC directed comexes to submit a compliance report in four days ie by September 23.

“Comexes generate around half of normal working day’s turnover on Saturday. This volume will be completely lost being most of trades in non-agri coming from day-traders. Anyway, comexes have been losing volumes consistently. This will be another reason for the fall,” said Priti Gupta, Executive director, Anand Rathi.