Commodities top asset class of FY11

Mumbai: Commodities is increasingly turning out to be a promising asset class that investors can’t just ignore. Amid swings of the global financial markets, commodities have beaten other asset classes including that of equities and debt to give the best returns in FY11.

The domestic benchmark for the movement in the commodity prices, the spot commodity index from MCX gained 30% during the fiscal while equity and debt markets provided lower returns in the range of 6-11%. Interestingly, real estate sector caught up with the gains in the commodity market with the capital value of the residential property in Mumbai appreciating 19% in the three quarters ending December 2010, according to an estimate by Jones Lang LaSalle, a real estate consultant.

According to experts, though the Mumbai residential real estate market has been seeing a slowdown over the last two quarters with the return of buyers’ market...and slowdown in registration and home loan disbursals.

According to a recent wealth report by Citi and Knight Frank, mumbai's prominence as world's leading hub. has doubled. The report adds that On average, property accounts for 35%* of the investment portfolios of ultra-high-net-worth individuals.

There was significant appreciation in prices of various types of commodities in the fiscal, including that of precious and industrial metals to agricultural commodities. While the growth momentum of emerging economies have provided a support to the prices of industrial commodities in the last several years, the ongoing recovery in the developed economies added to the price appreciation this fiscal.

Among the precious metals, silver prices more than doubled...