Ind AS applicability requires phased disclosure alignment in offer documents under SEBI ICDR, including transitional restatements and disclosures.
SEBI requires offer-document financial disclosures to follow the MCA phased Ind AS roadmap: specific prior years must be presented under Ind AS or prior accounting standards depending on filing date, issuers may opt to present all five years under Ind AS, and transition-year figures require restatement adjustments. Interim disclosures must follow the latest year's accounting policy. Where Ind AS is used, the issuer must state that fact, explain differences from prior standards, provide Ind AS 101 transition and interim disclosures, apply consistent accounting policies across disclosed years, and ensure Ind AS disclosures are audited or reviewed under SEBI (ICDR) Regulations.

Client code modification rules: restrict post-execution changes to exceptional cases and align exchanges with securities-market safeguards.
Modification of client codes after trades on commodity derivatives exchanges is constrained to an exception-based facility aligned with securities market provisions; exchanges must follow prior directional circulars, limit routine use of post-execution changes, and implement the superseding directive to protect investor interests and ensure market integrity.

Cyber security framework mandated for national commodity derivatives exchanges; requires governance, resilience measures and compliance reporting.
SEBI mandates a cyber security and cyber resilience framework for National Commodity Derivatives Exchanges, extending the MIIs framework to commodity derivatives markets. The framework covers Governance; Identify; Protection; Monitoring and Detection; Response and Recovery; Sharing of Information; Training; and Periodic Audit. Exchanges must amend bye laws/rules, implement the measures and report implementation status to SEBI. The circular is effective from January 1, 2017 and is issued under SEBI's regulatory powers to protect investor interests and regulate the securities market.

FPI investment limits in government securities increased with phased implementation, auction/on tap allocation, and rollover of unused long term limits.
The circular increases FPI investment caps in Central Government securities, Long Term FPIs and State Development Loans with phased effective dates, sets revised aggregated caps, and prescribes allocation by exchange auctions (with a 15 day utilisation period) and on tap availability for incremental long term and SDL limits. It provides for reallocation of any unutilised Long Term FPI limit at the end of a half year to all FPIs for the subsequent half year and reaffirms existing conditions including security wise limits, coupon treatment outside caps, and a minimum residual maturity of three years.

Mutual fund disclosure requirements: expanded CAS, commission and expense transparency, executive pay and in house credit risk checks.
SEBI requires Consolidated Account Statements to include each scheme's cost and, for half-yearly CASs, actual distributor commissions (monetary and non-monetary) and scheme average Total Expense Ratio for direct and regular plans. Offer documents and AMC websites must disclose fund manager tenure and names, top ten holdings, sector allocations, portfolio turnover, FoF underlying expense ratios, aggregate investments by key persons, and an illustrative impact of expense ratios. AMCs must publish executive remuneration, adopt in-house credit risk assessment policies, restrict and disclose soft-dollar benefits, permit limited NFO proceeds deployment in CBLO without charging fees, and comply with a revised MCR submission date.

Commodity derivatives eligibility clarified as tradable securities in IFSCs, permitting IFSC stock exchanges to permit dealing.
The circular specifies Commodity Derivatives as eligible securities for trading in International Financial Services Centres, notes that recognised commodity derivatives associations are deemed recognised stock exchanges, and directs that stock exchanges operating in IFSCs may permit dealing in commodity derivatives under SEBI's regulatory powers to protect investors and promote securities market development.

FPI investment permissions expanded to include REITs, InvITs and Category III AIFs, subject to regulatory conditions.
Permits FPIs to invest in units of REITs, InvITs and Category III AIFs under Regulation 21(1)(n), subject to SEBI terms and a maximum FPI stake in Category III AIFs. Authorises FPIs to acquire NCDs/bonds under default, guided by RBI definitions for amortising bonds; restructured instruments must have a minimum revised maturity of three years. FPIs must disclose offer terms to Debenture Trustees and investments count against the extant corporate debt limit while remaining subject to existing corporate debt rules.

Exchange Traded Cross Currency Derivatives: permitted subject to specified trading hours, position limits, dynamic price bands and margining.
SEBI permits recognized exchanges to introduce cross currency futures and options on EUR USD, GBP USD and USD JPY and exchange traded currency options on EUR INR, GBP INR and JPY INR, subject to RBI permissions, prescribed position limits, submission of contract specifications to SEBI, specified trading hours with enhanced intra day SPAN updates, Dynamic Price Bands for orderly trading, and a detailed margining, settlement and risk management framework including initial, extreme loss and calendar spread margins and INR cash settlement.

Unclaimed mutual fund amounts allowed in dedicated liquid plans; enhanced disclosure and payout rules secure claimant principal and earned income.
Unclaimed redemption and dividend amounts may be invested in a separate Liquid or Money Market Mutual Fund plan without exit load and with TER capped at fifty basis points. Mutual Funds and AMFI must publish lists of investors with unclaimed amounts on their websites (accessible upon proper credentials) and disclose prevailing values in periodic account statements. Claims within three years receive principal plus income earned; claims after three years receive principal plus income only up to the end of the third year, with subsequent income directed to investor education. Simple and performing schemes explicitly include retirement benefit and liquid/money market schemes.

Sector exposure limits tightened; issuer and group concentration curbs imposed with mandatory trustee half yearly review and reporting.
The circular tightens concentration limits for debt schemes by reducing issuer-level investment limits with conditional board-approved extensions, revising sector exposure caps and introducing group-level exposure limits (with a board-approved increase mechanism), imposing rating and registration conditions for additional Housing Finance Company exposure, requiring half-yearly trustee review and confirmation of aggregate exposures, and making the revised rules immediately applicable to new schemes and fresh investments while existing open-ended schemes must comply within one year.

Offer for Sale mechanism revised: retail bids deferred to next trading day while non retail bids may be carried forward.
Revision of the Offer for Sale mechanism reallocates bidding windows and settlement timing to encourage retail participation: sellers must notify exchanges by the day before the OFS; non retail bidders alone may bid on the opening day to determine the cut off price; retail investors bid on the next trading day with any retail discount applicable only to those bids; settlement for retail bids follows the normal post trade cycle. Non retail bidders may elect to carry forward and revise bids to the retail day, and unsubscribed retail shares are reallocated to such carried forward non retail bids at cut off price or higher.

Position limits for agricultural commodity futures revised; client MWOI cap removed and near month netting disallowed.
Revision of open position limits for agricultural commodity futures removes the client level market wide open interest cap and prescribes that near month position exposure be capped at one fourth of the overall position limit. Overall and near month positions are calculated by aggregating all long positions and all short positions separately and taking the higher; netting of near month with far month contracts is prohibited. Member overall limits are the greater of the numerical limit or fifteen percent of market wide open interest, with client and proprietary positions aggregated without netting.

Board composition restrictions bar trading or clearing members and associates from exchange boards, with limited public-bank exemptions.
Amendment replaces Para 14.1 to bar trading members, clearing members, their associates and agents from the governing boards of recognised stock exchanges and clearing corporations; deems directors of entities that are trading/clearing members or have such associates to be trading/clearing members for this purpose, with a proviso excluding directors of public financial institutions or public sector banks (or where ultimate promoter is public or shareholding is well diversified) and certain independent directors. Appointments remain subject to other eligibility requirements and regulatory satisfaction, and exchanges must continuously monitor compliance and update bye-laws, notify members and report implementation.

Aadhaar e-KYC: voluntary biometric or OTP verification allowed for client onboarding, with PAN verification and KRA upload required.
Aadhaar e-KYC is voluntary; intermediaries using KYC Service Agencies must register as KYC User Agencies. Clients may provide name, Aadhaar number and PAN electronically; intermediaries shall validate Aadhaar via biometric authentication (or OTP for certain mutual fund cases) and verify PAN from the income tax website. UIDAI-supplied KYC data is sufficient for KYC verification and must be uploaded to the KRA. Discrepancies in name or unclear Aadhaar photographs trigger additional due diligence and documentary records. AML, PMLA and SEBI KYC obligations continue to apply.

Streamlining public issue processing: enhanced bid validation, coordinated fund blocking and fixed timelines for publishing basis of allotment.
Clarification directs stock exchanges to validate electronic bids with depository records during the bidding period and notify intermediaries of inconsistencies for correction. Syndicate members, brokers, DPs and registrars may forward daily physical applications to designated SCSB branches for fund blocking for small value applications, following the November 10, 2015 schedule. Exchanges will share electronic bid files for small applications with registrars and SCSBs to enable daily blocking, and SCSBs must block funds based on the final electronic bid file provided by the registrar. Working days exclude Sundays and bank holidays; timelines for basis of allotment publication are prescribed.

Enhanced position limits for bank stock brokers authorised by RBI permit larger gross open positions in USD INR currency derivatives.
Revised regulatory limits allow authorised bank stock brokers to maintain larger gross open positions in USD INR currency derivatives than other brokers: non authorised participants are subject to a percentage cap of total open interest or a baseline dollar threshold, while RBI authorised bank stock brokers may operate under an enhanced baseline threshold; RBI will notify SEBI and exchanges of eligible bank stock brokers; other prior conditions remain unchanged and exchanges must update rules, systems, notifications and report implementation to SEBI.

Daily Price Limits reduced for agricultural derivatives to curb speculation, with near month limits tightened and forward trades suspended.
Daily Price Limits for agricultural commodity derivatives are restructured into Initial and Enhanced slabs with a uniform total DPL of 4% (specified commodities: 2% initial + 2% enhanced; others: 3% initial + 1% enhanced), trading remaining within the initial slab for 15 minutes before enhancement; norms apply on all trading days from February 1, 2016. Near month position limits are reduced from 50% to 25% for contracts expiring March 2016 onwards. Entry into fresh forward contracts is suspended while existing forward contracts may be settled. Exchanges must amend rules, notify members, publish the changes, and report implementation.

Exit policy for commodity exchanges mandates exit after prolonged suspension and resumption only with prior regulatory approval.
Exchanges with prolonged suspension of trading or persistent failure to meet turnover or market share criteria shall be liable to exit; resumption requires restoration of adequate trading, clearing, surveillance and risk management systems and prior SEBI approval. On de recognition, assets cannot be alienated without SEBI approval, a SEBI appointed valuation will determine distributable assets after statutory dues, transfer of investor protection funds to SEBI, payment of regulatory and broker registration fees, recovery of broker dues from deposits or proceeds, and provision for pending claims and contingent liabilities.

Public shareholding compliance requires monitoring, prior approvals and freezing measures to enforce ownership limits for listed exchanges.
Prescribes mechanisms to maintain public shareholding and enforce ownership limits for listed stock exchanges: continuous category-wise disclosure, depository systems to capture and monitor demat holdings of trading members and related parties, daily monitoring and alerting on threshold breaches, prior approval requirements for acquisitions approaching limits, and freezing of voting rights and corporate benefits until divestment through a special exchange window.

Application cum bidding form standardization: mandated ASBA payment fields, investor identifiers and retail cut off rules in public issue forms.
The circular standardizes the Application Cum Bidding Form and disclosure for ASBA based public issues: A4 booklet format with colored identifiers for resident/non resident forms; eight digit application number; intermediary stamps; applicant details including PAN and a 16 digit depository account field; investor category/status; bid option table with cut off rules limited to retail bidders; ASBA payment fields with bank account and amount blocked; applicant confirmations, signatures and SCSB authorization; and acknowledgement slips reflecting upload and payment blocking.