The Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) board has approved a regulatory framework for Index Providers with the objective of fostering transparency and accountability in the governance and administration of financial benchmarks in the securities market.
The regulations will provide a framework for registration of Index Providers which license ‘Significant Indices’ that shall be notified by SEBI based on objective criteria, the market regulator said in a release on Saturday.
The regulatory framework which is in accordance with IOSCO Principles for Financial Benchmarks shall only be applicable to ‘Significant Indices’, it said.
These were among the decisions taken by the board of SEBI during its meeting held here.
The board, in its 203rd meeting, also approved flexibility in the framework for social stock exchange. It reduced the minimum issue size of zero coupon zero principal instruments by non-profit organisations from Rs 1 crore to Rs 50 lakh.
The board also discussed delisting norms.
Addressing a press briefing, SEBI Chairperson Madhabi Puri Buch said, “It (delisting norms) was discussed in the board meeting…The board guided us that since the number of delisting applications, even over taking a long period five years, has been pretty small, and therefore, the data set is pretty limited, drawing a very significant conclusion from that may be very difficult. And therefore, the board has guided us to go back and do certain further examinations of data and do further consultations with certain stakeholders, so that we have a better sense of this (delisting) since the data set was actually very limited. That is the reason that it was not done this time.”