Gold imports grew practically 200% in October 2025 to $14.7 billion from $4.9 billion in October 2024. File. | Photo Credit: Reuters
India’s complete exports in October 2025 stood at $72.9 billion, down marginally from $73.4 billion in October final yr. India’s complete imports jumped to $94.7 billion in October this yr, in contrast with $82.4 billion in October 2024. As a consequence, the commerce deficit grew to $21.8 billion in October this yr from $9.05 billion final yr.
“There are two issues which have introduced this improve within the commerce deficit about,” Commerce Secretary Rajesh Agrawal mentioned at a press briefing. “The first is gold and the opposite is silver. The improve in gold imports has been phenomenal in October regardless of very excessive world costs.”
“In silver additionally, the expansion has been phenomenal,” he defined. “If you mix these two, these account for the extra commerce deficit.”
Gold imports grew practically 200% in October 2025 to $14.7 billion from $4.9 billion in October 2024. In truth, gold imports in October reversed the pattern that had been seen within the April-September interval of this monetary yr.
That is, whereas gold imports within the April-September 2025 interval have been 8.7% decrease than in the identical interval of the earlier yr, the leap in October meant that gold imports in April-October 2025 have been 21.4% greater than in April-October 2024.
Similarly, silver imports grew practically 530% in October 2025 to $2.7 billion.
“An uninterrupted rise in gold costs forward of the festive season could have led to speculative demand which can not maintain going forward, probably resulting in some cooling within the import numbers within the ensuing months,” Aditi Nayar, chief economist at ICRA mentioned. “Nevertheless, the non-oil, non-gold imports rose by a considerable 12.4% year-on-year, led by fertilisers, equipment, digital items, non-ferrous metals, and silver.”
Digging deeper into India’s complete exports, the merchandise exports fell 11.8% to $34.4 billion in October 2025, whereas companies exports grew 11.9% to $38.5 billion.
On the imports aspect, merchandise imports grew 16.7% in October 2025 to $76.1 billion and companies imports grew 8.1% to $18.6 billion.
Published – November 17, 2025 07:18 pm IST
