The National Spot Exchange Ltd on Wednesday offered to settle trades worth Rs 5,574 crore over seven months (31 weeks) to over 13,000 investors even as the Prime Minister’s Office set up a task force in the Finance Ministry to look at settlement issues.
According to the NSEL plan submitted to the Forward Markets Commission, it will settle Rs 3,494.4 crore this year in weekly instalments of Rs 174.02 crore. Another Rs 860 crore will be paid in ten weekly instalments of Rs 86.02 crore each during the January-March quarter.
The proposal is a change of stance by the exchange that had sought five months time to settle the dues to the investors. In a bid to clamp down on wilful defaulters, the exchange plans to recover dues worth nearly Rs 1,220 crore by selling commodities, fixed assets and land, among other measures, the NSEL said in a press release on Wednesday.
NSEL will make a pay-in every Friday and pay-out every subsequent Tuesday. According to sources, the exchange has deposits of less than Rs 100 crore in a separate account that has been opened to settle the dues.
The Forward Markets Commission has asked the exchange to upload the settlement plan on its Web site and get feedback from investors and brokers. The Commission will take a view after receiving the response.
The task force set up by the Prime Minister’s Office will include officials from the Ministry of Corporate Affairs, Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Directorate of Revenue Intelligence, SEBI, and Enforcement Directorate.
Task force mandate
Its mandate will be to examine whether the NSEL or its associate company or any market intermediaries have violated any rules or regulations.
Absolving the promoter group, including Jignesh Shah and Financial Technologies from the settlement crisis, Anjani Sinha, Managing Director and CEO, National Spot Exchange Ltd, said: “As the Managing Director and CEO, I and my management team at the National Spot Exchange have been solely and directly responsible for all operations, including screening of parties, warehouse management, risk management and other related company matters.”
He said that there are 24 buyers who are required to complete funds pay-in obligation to ensure smooth settlement.
“The focus should be on these (24) buyers/processors for realisation of pending dues and on nothing else. I and my management team will solely focus on ensuring smooth settlement as per the schedule,” he said.