T+0 by March, instant a year later: Sebi The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) board on Saturday did not make any changes to existing delisting regulations, citing insufficient data. “Since the number of delisting applications over the five years was small, the data was quite limited to draw significant conclusions. Therefore, the board suggested we go back and gather more data, and undertake further consultations,” said Sebi chairperson Madhabi Puri-Buch, speaking to the press following the board meeting. Earlier, it was expected that the market regulator would make changes in the delisting regulations because companies and even legal experts have said that the process of delisting is rather complex. And even a small set of investors are able create significant hurdles to the process. As regards inclusion in derivatives, she said it is among the most complex data analysis done at Sebi, and the regulator needs more time to complete our data analysis. On the proposal to extend F&O trading hours, however, she said that they need feedback from all three constituents — exchanges, brokers, and investors — before taking a call. The regulator approved a host of measures at its board meeting. For social stock exchanges, it reduced the minimum issue size in case of public issuances of zero-coupon zero-principal instruments to Rs 50 lakh from Rs 1 crore, and minimum application size to Rs 10,000 from Rs 2 lakh. It also approved the framework for registration of index providers to license ‘significant indices’ notified by Sebi. Further, it amended the REIT regulations for the facilitation of small & medium REITs — with an asset value of Rs 50 crore rather than Rs 500 crore. Finally, the board approved proposals to amend AIF regulations, mandating that fresh investments into AIFs after September 2024 shall be held in the dematerialised form. Responding to questions, Buch also said that the price discovery mechanism for IPOs was not perfect. She pointed out that institutional investors buy big but retail investor buy small, which is why it would be prudent for the latter to wait for the price to settle after IPOs, take into account its financials, etc, before investing via the secondary market.
However, he believes that the impact on the Indian market is going to be temporary since there could be some short-term impact on flows into Indian equity markets. But since the Indian economy is on a strong wicket and will continue to remain resilient.
“Improved fiscal situation, controlled current deficit, stable interest scenario combined with good corporate earnings should lead to limited impact on the Indian bond market and equity market too,” he added.
The midcap and smallcap indices took a bigger knock with the BSE MidCap fell 2.51%, while BSE SmallCap index dived 4.18%. According to Amnish Aggarwal, head, research, Prabhudas Lilladher, the valuations were already high and some correction was expected. “If the situation sustains as it is then further correction can’t be ruled out,” Aggarwal said.
Telecommunication and industrials indices were the top laggards with BSE Telecommunication declining 3.82%, followed by BSE Industrials falling 3.26%. JSW Steel (-2.99%), Tata Steel (-2.52%) and Tata Consultancy Services (-2.44%) were the top losers of Sensex.
Surprisingly, both foreign portfolio investors and domestic institutional investors were net buyers today. While, FPIs net bought shares worth Rs 252.25 crore, DIIs have purchased shares worth Rs 1,111.84 crore, as per provisional data from exchanges.
Calling this a “normal phenomena” Pankaj Pandey, head, research, ICICI Direct said, “I will not really give too much weight to a single day buying figure. Amid concerns of elevated interest rate and geopolitical tensions, in a typical market cycle, 8-10% correction is possible at any point in time.”
The brunt of geopolitical conflict, elevated interest rates and rising crude oil prices was also felt by other Asian- Pacific markets. Jakarta Composite Index lost 1.57% followed by Shanghai Composite Index and PSEi, which fell 1.47% and 0.89%, respectively. Nikkei and KOSPI declined 0.83% and 0.76%.