Government of India has inserted, by the Finance Act, 2012, a new Chapter XII-BB titled- ‘Special Provisions relating to Conversion of Indian Branch of a Foreign Bank into a Subsidiary Company’ in Income Tax Act, 1961, inter alia, exempting capital gains arising from such conversion from capital gains tax, with effect from April 1, 2013.
SEBI released the Development Research Group (DRG) Study titled, Impact of Increased Derivatives-Trading in India on the Price-Discovery Process. The study is co-authored by Prof. Banikanta Mishra, Dr. Sarat Malik, and Laltu Pore.
The SEBI (Foreign Portfolio Investors) Regulations, 2013 have been framed keeping in view the provisions of SEBI (Foreign Institutional Investors) Regulations, 1995, Qualified Foreign Investors (QFIs) framework and the recommendations of the Committee on Rationalization of Investment Routes and Monitoring of Foreign Portfolio Investments.
With a view to streamline the investor grievance redressal mechanism at Stock Exchanges and make it more effective from the angle of investor protection, SEBI has decided to give monetary relief to investors having claims upto Rs.10 lac, during the course of proceedings from the Investor Protection Fund of Stock Exchange. Further, SEBI has decided to shorten the time taken for these proceedings.
For ensuring investments are genuine angel investments, angel funds shall invest only in venture capital undertakings which are not more than 3 years old, have a turnover not exceeding Rs 25 crore, are not promoted, sponsored or related to an Industrial Group whose group turnover is in excess of Rs. 300 crore, and have no family connection with the investors proposing to invest in the company.
Attention is also drawn to Rule 9(2) of the PML (Maintenance of Records) Rules, 2005 (Government of India, Ministry of Finance, Department of Revenue, Notification dated August 27, 2013) which provides that a reporting entity may rely on third party client due diligence subject to conditions mentioned therein.
Shri S Raman, Whole Time Member, SEBI has passed an order dated September 6, 2013, in the matter of synchronized trading by connected persons and issued directions restraining from accessing the capital market and prohibiting from buying, selling or otherwise dealing in the securities market, directly or indirectly, for a period mentioned against the entities..
SEBI has issued directions to MCX-SX Limited and MCX-SX Clearing Corporation Limited (MCX-SXCCL) to strengthen their governance structure while granting the renewal of recognition to MCX-SX Limited for a period of one year commencing from September 16, 2013. The conditions imposed by SEBI are :
It may be noted that the Reserve Bank of India had announced the revised guidelines for overseas direct investment by Indian parties on August 14, 2013. This measure had been taken in the context of current macro-economic situation. It was not the intention of the Reserve Bank of India to restrict bona-fide and genuine overseas direct investment transactions by Indian companies.
SEBI would like to appreciate the effort and time that has been put in by IMF and World Bank team to assess the Indian securities market including the securities settlement systems and central counterparties in the securities markets. The third party assessments and suggestions like the ones provided by the FSAP are very important to us as it highlights areas that may contribute toward further improvement of the system.
