Over seven million shares of the National Stock Exchange of India (NSE) changed hands in March at an average price of Rs 2,947 per share.
Close to 1.51 million shares changed hands between domestic investors while transactions for about 4.7 million happened between NRIs and Indian investors. Another 914,000 shares changed hands between foreign and domestic investors.
The share price of the exchange in the unlisted market had rallied to Rs 3,500-3600 between 2019 and 2021 amid rising profitability and hopes of an IPO. The prices have cooled to below Rs 3,000 in the past year.
NSE’s shareholding is a lot more diffused today. Shareholder numbers have grown from under 100 to over 4,300 in the past six years, with several high net worth individuals and family offices lapping up the shares. The percentage of individuals holding has risen to 10.7% as of March 31, 2023, from 1.16% seven years ago.
For the past three years, NSE has been the largest exchange in the world in terms of number of F&O contracts traded and enjoys a monopoly in the space in India. The exchange has been steadily gaining market share in the cash market as well — from 83% in FY13 to 93% in FY23.
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NSE shareholders have been pushing the exchange to go public since 2015. The exchange had filed for its IPO in December 2016, but was asked to withdraw its offer documents pending investigations into the co-location scam. In FY21, the exchange approached the market regulator for a nod to its IPO plan, which did not elicit a response. The co-location scam and issues pertaining to former bosses Chitra Ramkrishna and Ravi Narain as well as a mysterious yogi have also put a spanner in its IPO plans.
Earlier this year, the Securities Appellate Tribunal set aside the market regulator’s Rs 624 crore disgorgement order against NSE.
Subsequently, the Supreme Court, by way of partial relief to the NSE in the co-location matter, directed the market regulator to refund Rs 300 crore to NSE, which was deposited by NSE as per the disgorgement orders. However, the apex court did not stay the SAT order that struck down the disgorgement order passed by the regulator against NSE.