Brokers seek time to prepare infra for same-day settlement

India became the first country to implement a T+1 settlement cycle for all listed stocks on 27 January 2023

- Ram Sahgal & Neha Joshi

Retail investors' dreams of settling their trades on the same day that transactions occur aren't likely to materialize significantly more than a year after the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) launched the same-day settlement cycle, or T+0.

At a meeting last week, close to 10 qualified stock brokers (QSBs) requested that market regulator Sebi extend the 1 May deadline for offering a same-day settlement option to their clients desiring such a cycle.

As most top brokers are operationally unprepared for such a cycle, Sebi could extend the deadline for the QSBs to provide their clients with the option of same-day settlement.

Currently, very few brokers offer this option to clients as their risk management and order management systems cannot handle the scale for a same-day settlement.