Mumbai: Sebi asked stock exchanges to facilitate in a time-bound manner the process for listing of companies that are currently trading on non-compliant bourses.
The capital market regulator's latest direction comes against the backdrop of May 30 deadline, whereby stock exchanges that have not achieved the prescribed turnover of Rs 1,000 crore on continuous basis would be de-recognised. "The exclusively listed companies of non-compliant stock exchanges may opt for listing in nation-wide exchanges after complying with listing norms of main board or the diluted listing norms, if any, on or before the exit of the exchange, either on voluntary or compulsory basis," Sebi said in a circular.
According to the regulator, stock exchanges should facilitate the listing of such companies on priority basis in a time-bound manner. Stock exchanges have been directed to "immediately create a separate dedicated cell to expedite processing of listing requests from such companies," Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) said. Companies which are "exclusively listed" on non-compliant exchanges can also opt for voluntary delisting before the de-recognition of those bourses. "Nation-wide stock exchanges shall provide a platform to these companies to facilitate reverse book building for voluntary delisting using their platform," Sebi said.
Besides those that fail to obtain listing on any other stock exchange, such entities which do not opt for voluntary delisting as well as those that do not fall under 'vanishing companies' category would cease to remain listed. As per the Corporate Affairs Ministry, companies that are not traceable or where data is not available for more than three years are generally described as 'vanishing companies'. In the context of today's circular, Sebi has asked exchanges to initiate the process of identifying vanishing companies. "It shall be the responsibility of the exchanges which are being de recognised either on voluntary or compulsory basis, to place their exclusively listed companies on the dissemination board," the market watchdog said.
These exchanges would have to ensure that the database of the exclusively listed company is transferred to Sebi and to those bourses on whose dissemination board, the shares of these companies are available, it added.
