SEBI TO CONDUCT INVESTOR SURVEY

Capital markets regulator Sebi has decided to conduct a nationwide survey to take stock of the savings and investment trends among the Indian households and ascertain the impact and changing dynamics of securities market. The proposed 'Investor Survey' would cover the entire country -- 29 states and 7 union territories -- and would have a sample size of approximately 50,000 households and 1000 market participants. This is the second major survey being undertaken by the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) after a previous one in 2008-09, which was conducted immediately after global recession and the Indian markets undergone significant changes since then. According to Sebi, the new survey would seek to determine savings and investment behaviour of households, and understand the investment pattern in various instruments depending upon education, financial literacy, income, consumption, location and other demographic factors. The survey would also determine risk profile of the investors and relate it to savings and investment behaviour, estimate the number of household investors in the securities market, find out the reasons for non-investment in securities market and understand the impact of regulatory policies on investment in securities market. The survey would find out the impact of investor education on investments, compare the results of the previous survey with the current one and find out changes in investor population (growth/decline) as well as their behaviour etc. Besides, it would also help in understanding the response of various market participants under dynamic market situations, their perspective on investor awareness, penetration of securities market, business environment and concerns on regulatory aspects etc. The regulator has decided to rope in an independent survey agency for the job and the interested agencies would need to submit an expression of interest by the end of this month. In the last five years, the benchmark indices Sensex and Nifty have gained over 100 per cent, while household investment in financial assets has increased by just about 33 per cent from Rs 7,26,900 crore in 2008-09 to Rs 10,96,900 crore in 2012-13. "Further, there are several policy initiatives and introduction of new products in the securities market. These developments are likely to have an influence on the investment pattern and investment behaviour of households," Sebi said while inviting EoIs for the proposed survey. "The advancements in technological innovations have impacted the market dynamics and influenced businesses of various market participants," it added.