Lotus MF to launch new schemes
Mumbai: Lotus Mutual Fund is planning to launch new schemes. The Mutual Fund was in the news for all the wrong reasons like the resignation of its chief investment officer (CIO) Sandeep Sabharwal for his alleged involvement in stocks manipulated by Ketan Parekh during his tenure at SBI Mutual Fund.

The mutual fund has already filed the draft documents with the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) to launch new funds - Lotus India Equity Fund and Lotus India Tax Plan.

While Lotus India Equity Fund will be a close-ended diversified equity scheme with a three-year maturity period, Lotus India Tax Plan is an open-ended equity linked savings scheme.

According to the offer document, the equity fund will be benchmarked against the BSE-100 index. Officials at Lotus Mutual Fund refused to comment on new schemes, saying they were awaiting the approval from the Sebi.

The fund is yet to find a replacement for Sandeep Sabharwal. Sources at Lotus MF said the fund house was talking to several fund managers to step into Sabharwal's shoes. Apparently, the draft document does not name fund managers for the schemes.

Lotus Asset Management Company is a joint venture between Fullerton Fund Management, which is a subsidiary of Temasek, the investment arm of the Singapore government, and Sabr Capital Worldwide.
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SEBI eases entry/exit norms for F&O contracts
Mumbai: SEBI-constituted Secondary Market Advisory Committee (SMAC) has relaxed its entry norms for reintroduction of derivative contracts and modified position limits. Industry sources said that it would increase liquidity and the number of participants in the F&O segment.

The modified position limits will ensure that more and more people can trade in index F&Os said derivatives dealers.
Other relaxations of norms include stocks, which have been dropped from derivatives trading may become eligible again and reintroduced for derivatives trading, if they meets the eligibility criteria for three consecutive months, instead of the one month specified earlier.

Derivative contracts on such stocks may be reintroduced by the exchange itself. However, the introduction of F&O contracts on a stock for the first time would continue to be subject to the SEBI approval.

The stock will have to fail to meet the criteria for three consecutive months for it to be dropped out of the derivatives segment.

Capital market sources said that earlier the market wide position was linked to 30 day trading volume or 20 per cent of free float capital.

The committee has also modified the trading Member/FII/ Mutual Fund position limits in the index-based derivative contracts. Henceforth, a trading member/FII/Mutual Fund position limits in equity index option contracts shall be higher of Rs500 crore or 15 per cent of the total open interest in the market in equity index option contracts. This is against the Rs250-crore limit earlier. The modified limit would be applicable on open positions in all option contracts on a particular underlying index.

Similarly, trading member/FII/Mutual Fund Position limits in equity index futures contracts will also be higher of Rs500 crore or 15 per cent of the total open interest in the market in equity index futures contracts. This is also against the Rs250-crore limit specified earlier. In addition to the above, the position limit prescribed for hedging purposes by mutual fund and FII shall continue to be applicable, the circular said.
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SEBI suspends brokerage houses
Mumbai: The SEBI has suspended the certificates of registration of Sakshi Stocks and Shares Pvt Ltd and Malay Investment and Financial Services Pvt Ltd, which are members of the Uttar Pradesh Stock Exchange, on charges of certain irregularities and contraventions of SEBI Regulations for fifteen days.

The brokerages were booked for infringements like non-maintenance of order books, document register and margin deposit book and non-collection of margins. Sakshi Stocks and Shares would be barred from trading between October 6 and October 20, and Malay Investment would be disallowed trading from October 10 to October 24, said.
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Accel Frontline to float IPO
Mumbai: Accel Frontline, the information technology service provider in consulting, infrastructure, applications, outsourcing and support segments, will debut on the stock market with an initial public offering of 56.36 lakh equity shares of Rs10 each through a 100 per cent book building process on September 28.

The issue, which opens on September 28 and closes on October 5, constitutes 25.04 per cent of the diluted post-issue paid-up capital of the company.

The price band has been fixed between Rs75 and Rs90 per share. The issue comprises 51.75 lakh equity shares by Accel Frontline Ltd and an offer for sale of 4.60 lakh equity shares by its partner Intel Pacific, INC. Fifty per cent of the offer to the public will be allocated to qualified institutional buyers (QIBs), out of which 5 per cent will be available for allocation to mutual funds registered with SEBI and the remaining QIB portion will be available for allocation to the QIB bidders, including mutual funds.

Fifteen per cent of the offer shall be available for allocation on a proportionate basis to non-institutional bidders and 35 per cent shall be available for allocation on a proportionate basis to retail individual bidders.

SBI Capital Markets Ltd is the book running lead manager (BRLM), Bajaj Capital Ltd is the co-BRLM and Intime Spectrum Registry Ltd is the registrar.
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Everest Kanto to issue 19 lakh shares
Mumbai: City-based Everest Kanto Cylinder said it will issue 18.96 lakh equity shares to Brightwill, for Rs92 crore on preferential basis.

The board of directors at its meeting yesterday, approved the preferential issue of 18.96 lakh equity shares to Brightwill at Rs485 per share. The preferential issue would be subject to a lock-in period of one year in accordance with SEBI guidelines and would result in additional issue of 9.72 per cent shares of the enhanced equity share capital, it added.

Brightwill is a subsidiary of a fund managed by CLSA Pvt Equity Management.
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BSE plans rights issue: drops bonus plan
Mumbai: The Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) has cancelled its plan to issue bonus shares to members and has instead decided to come out with a rights issue to augment capital.

BSE aims to become eligible for an initial public offering (IPO) at a later stage.

BSE has declared a 1000 per cent special dividend for members, in addition to the regular 132 per cent dividend.

The proposed rights issue is expected to increase BSE's paid-up capital to Rs3 crore, making the Asia's oldest exchange eligible for an IPO, under its own regulations. The rights issue proposal was approval, instead of an earlier proposal for bonus shares as rules by Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) do not allow bonus shares, a BSE member told BS.
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Sebi extends PAN deadline to Dec 31
Mumbai: Sebi has extended the deadline for making Permanent Account Number (PAN) compulsory for all stock market transactions by three months to December 31, 2006 from October 1.
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Sebi fines Mathew Easow Rs20 lakh
Mumbai: The SEBI has imposed a fine of Rs20 lakh on Mathew Easow, associated with Mathew Easow Research Securities (MER) and Mathew Easow Fiscal Services (MEF), for taking up a contrary trading position against his recommendations to investors on Moneycontrol.com in the stocks of Kalpana Industries, CESC, Ahlcon Parent and Albert David.

Easow recommended a buy on the stocks of the above companies, while he sold the stocks of those companies in September 2005.

The SEBI has imposed the penalty amounting to thrice the amount of profit earned by MER and MEF during the relevant period on the four scrips.
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