By Pratik Parija Dec. 24 (Bloomberg) -- The Multi Commodity Exchange of India Ltd. and its domestic rivals posted a 48.6 percent jump in trading volumes in the eight-and-half months ended Dec. 15, led by agricultural goods. Commodities worth 52 trillion rupees ($1.1 trillion) changed hands, compared with 35 trillion rupees a year ago, the Forward Markets Commission said in a statement on its Web site. Trading in farm commodities almost doubled to 8.4 trillion rupees in the period after the government ended a ban on soybean oil, rubber, potato, chickpeas and wheat futures. Turnover in gold and silver gained 7 percent to 20.5 trillion rupees, the regulator said. Contracts worth 4.44 trillion rupees changed hands on the exchanges in the two weeks ended Dec. 15, more than double the 1.9 trillion rupees a year ago, the regulator said. Domestic traders, producers and consuming companies are the main participants in India’s 22 commodity exchanges. Overseas funds aren’t allowed to buy and sell commodity futures. To contact the reporter on this story: Pratik Parija in New Delhi at pparija@bloomberg.net.

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