TEHRAN- During weekdays ended on October 17, while 566,556 tons of commodities worth over $642 million were traded at Iran Mercantile Exchange (IME), the trading value and volume experienced growth of 22 percent and 29 percent, respectively.

According to a report from IME International Affairs and Public Relations Department, last week, on the domestic and export metal and mineral trading floor of IME, 253,102 tons of various products worth $339 million were traded.

On this trading floor, 187,342 tons of steel, 3,940 tons of copper, 5,780 tons of aluminum, 120 tons of molybdenum concentrates, 12 tons of precious metal concentrates as well as 23 kg of gold bullion were traded by customers.

The report declares that on domestic and export oil and petrochemical trading floors of IME, 312,814 tons of different commodities with the total value of $314 million were traded.

On this trading floor, 114,000 tons of VB feed stock, 62,673 tons of bitumen, 82,673 tons of polymer products, 54,000 tons of lube cut oil, 41,090 tons of chemical products, 3,640 tons of insulation, 2,024 tons of argon as well as 19,000 tons of sulfur were traded.

Furthermore, 640 tons of commodities were traded on the side market of IME.

On June 24, during the meeting of IME shareholders, IME Managing Director Hamed Soltani-Nejad said that this exchange has prepared ten macro plans to improve its performance during the current Iranian calendar year (ends on March 19, 2020).

He mentioned development of underlying assets through existing instruments, development of financial instruments for commodity-backed securities, expansion of market size and depth, increasing cooperation with other organizations, and strengthening IME brand as some of the mentioned macro plans.

Soltani-Nejad has previously announced that IME accounted for 39 percent of the value of the total trades in the Iranian capital market during the past Iranian calendar year.

He put the value of IME trades at 1.78 quadrillion rials (about $42.3 billion) in the past year.

The value of trades at IME rose 52 percent in the past calendar year from its previous year.

Over 24.84 million tons of commodities valued at 884.3 trillion rials (about $21.05 billion) were traded at the physical market of IME, showing seven percent fall in the amount and 77 percent rise in the worth of trades year on year.

Applying new financial instruments in Iranian capital market was one of the achievements of the country’s exchange markets during the past year. 

In this due, IME launched “option” in early March 2019 in an approach to diversify financing methods for agricultural products.

Option is a contract which gives the buyer (the owner or holder of the option) the right, but not the obligation, to buy or sell an underlying asset or instrument at a specified strike price prior to or on a specified date, depending on the form of the option. 

And last week, IME launched “futures contract” for the pistachio deals.

Futures contracts (more colloquially, futures) are financial contracts obligating the buyer to purchase an asset or the seller to sell an asset at a predetermined future date and price.

Addressing the ceremony to launch this financial instrument, Soltani-Nejad said, “There is no futures contract for pistachio deals in any mercantile exchange in the world and it is the first time that such contract is launched in a mercantile exchange.”

MA/MA