INDIA. Mumbai: Amid market volatility following the Adani matter, the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) on Saturday said the Indian financial market, represented by the Sensex and Nifty, has demonstrated stability and has continued to function in a transparent, fair, and efficient manner.
Even though the SEBI didn’t mention the Adani case, it said in a statement that investors have been happy with Indian markets for a long time.
A cross-country comparison of dollar-adjusted market returns with both peer and developed countries during the past 3 years till date, places the Indian market as a positive outlier.
“During the past week, unusual price movement in the stocks of a business conglomerate has been observed. As part of its mandate, SEBI seeks to maintain the orderly and efficient functioning of the market and has put in place a set of well-defined, publicly available surveillance measures (including the ASM framework) to address excessive volatility in specific stocks. This mechanism gets automatically triggered under certain conditions of price volatility in any stock,” SEBI said.
“Further, in all specific entity-related matters, if any information comes to SEBI’s notice, then, as per extant policies, the same is examined, and after due examination, appropriate action is taken. SEBI has consistently followed this approach on entity-level issues and will continue to do so in the future as well. SEBI is committed to market integrity and to ensuring appropriate structural strength to function in an uninterrupted, transparent, and efficient manner, as has been the case so far,” SEBI added.
Officials confirmed that the statement has been issued in the wake of the Adani matter. The Bombay Stock Exchange and the National Stock Exchange have put three Adani Group companies under their short-term additional surveillance measure (ASM).
These companies are Adani Enterprises, Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone, and Ambuja Cements. This measure is meant to stop speculation and short-selling in these stocks by requiring a 100% upfront margin for intra-day trading.
The Adani Group has lost over $100 billion in market value since Hindenburg Research accused it of stock manipulation and accounting fraud in the January 24 report. The group has denied any wrongdoing and has threatened to sue Hindenburg.
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