SEBI Board Meet: Rules approved to make PSU delisting easier, what else was announced?

News Topical, Digital Desk : Many announcements have been made in SEBI's board meeting held today. According to the information given, SEBI has approved amendments to SEBI (Delisting of Equity Shares) Regulation, 2021 in its board meeting. Under this, special provisions have been made to ease the voluntary delisting process for select PSUs. These provisions will apply to those PSUs (except banks, NBFCs and insurance companies) which come under the supervision of a financial sector regulator and in which the combined stake of the Government of India, or other PSUs is 90 percent or more. Through these amendments, these PSUs will be given a fixed price delisting route instead of the existing reverse book-building route for exit.

Why relief is being given Last month, SEBI had issued a discussion paper on this subject and sought suggestions and comments from the public by May 26. It is a big challenge for PSUs to comply with the minimum public share holding rules. Under these rules, it is mandatory to bring the promoter's stake to 75 percent within three years of listing. Although PSUs have been given additional time for this, figures show that even today more than 20 government companies are not following this rule. The discussion paper was aimed at making the delisting process flexible for such PSUs in which the government stake is 90 percent or more. According to a Moneycontrol report, companies with more than 90 percent stake include KIOCL, IDBI Bank, Indian Overseas Bank, HMT, Punjab and Sind Bank, State Trading Corporation, UCO Bank, ITI and Fertilizers and Chemicals Travancore. What other rules were announced? Many other decisions were also taken in the SEBI board meeting in which relaxation has been given in the rules of investing in Indian bonds. At the same time, relaxation in regulatory rules has been announced for FPIs, in which now information of investor group will not have to be given, approval of ease of doing business for debenture trustee, simplification of disclosure format for portfolio management service, settlement scheme for some NSEL brokers and decision to simplify QIP, rights issue documentation, disclosure.

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