TORONTO (Reuters) — The commodity boom and a wave of takeovers are helping the small-cap TSX Venture Exchange grab a bit of the limelight usually trained on its big brother, the Toronto Stock Exchange.Like the bigger board's main index, the TSX Venture Exchange's composite index has climbed steadily since the fall, hitting a record high of 3,371.57 earlier this week.

The Venture market, home to many small resource companies, has risen about 10.4 percent so far this year. Toronto's S&P/TSX composite index , by comparison, is up 5.6 percent.

"The Venture Exchange is definitely attracting a lot more attention and we see that every day by watching the volume," said Jeremy Link, an analyst with Northern Securities Inc.

In 2002, the average daily volume of shares traded on the Venture market was less than 50 million shares a day. Now it is consistently above 200 million, Link said. The market is home to more than 2,000 companies. The about 500 that are listed on its composite index have market caps ranging from C$3 million to around C$1 billion, according to the Toronto Stock Exchange.

Both the Venture Exchange and the Toronto Stock Exchange are owned by TSX Group .

As of March, total capitalisation on the TSX Venture Exchange was C$62.9 billion.

Venture stock movements can be spectacular. The metal molybdenum, for instance, is in vogue, which has helped to cast attention on Roca Mines Inc. and Adanac Molybdenum Corp. , whose shares have risen 77 percent and 85 percent respectively so far this year.

Zinc and gold producer Acadian Gold Corp. and Blue Note Mining Inc. are other examples of small companies creeping into the spotlight, Link said.

As soon as the small Venture miners show promise, they can show up on radar of their bigger cousins on the Toronto market.