In a major relief, the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) on Friday decided to reduce the fee payable by brokers from Rs 15 to Rs 10 per crore of transactions, marking a 33.33 per cent reduction.
For agri-commodity derivative transactions, the fee has been reduced by a whopping 93.33 per cent--from Rs 15 to Re 1 per crore of transactions. The decisions were taken at a board meeting held in the national capital.
The regulator also reduced the fees payable by issuers for one refiling of offer documents by 50 per cent in case the refiling is done within one year of validity of observation letter.
SEBI also reduced the regulatory fee rate payable by the stock exchanges by 80 per cent from the current Rs 1 crore plus Rs 6 per crore for the turnover in excess of Rs 10 lakh crore without any upper ceiling.
The SEBI board also made changes to regulations for Infrastructure Investment Trusts (InViTs) and Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITS). The value of lot size will now be Rs 1 lakh for InVITs and Rs 50,000 for REITS.
It increased the leverage limit for InVITs to 70 per cent of assets from 49 per cent. The consolidated debt will be required to have a credit rating of AAA. InVITs will need to have at least six distributions in the preceeding years.
For corporate debt restructuring, the SEBI said exemptions from preferential issues guidelines and the open offer will be restricted to just scheduled commercial banks and financial institutions.
Exemptions will not be available for acquisition of shares by persons others than lenders. Reference to approval by the competent authority in the takeover code will be deleted, said the regulator.