Regulation 45 requires a recognised depository to enter into an agreement with one or more participants acting as its agents. The arrangement establishes the required agency relationship between the depository and its participant or participants.

Regulation 44 permits all securities defined under the SCRA and other permitted financial products to be held in dematerialised form with a recognised depository. Eligibility was broadened with effect from 1 November 2024 by replacing the earlier reference to eligible instruments under the IFSCA Act with other permitted financial products.

Priority of clearing corporation recovery applies to dues arising from clearing members' clearing and settlement functions. A recognised clearing corporation may recover these dues from the clearing members' collateral, deposits and assets, with priority over every other liability of or claim against the clearing members.

Recognised clearing corporations handling physically settled commodity derivatives must ensure a financial guarantee for trade settlement, including good delivery. Good delivery requires goods to be capable of transferring title and to conform to the quality and quantity specifications of the relevant exchange contract.

Payment and settlement through recognised stock exchanges and recognised clearing corporations must follow approved netting or gross procedures under their bye-laws. Such settlements are final, irrevocable and binding on the parties. Once settlement finality arises, the exchange or clearing corporation has priority to appropriate collateral, deposits or margins contributed by a broker dealer, clearing member or client towards settlement or other obligations, ahead of competing liabilities or claims. Finality arises when the payable obligations are determined, whether or not actual payment or delivery has occurred.

Bye-laws governing contracts and clearing and settlement must be made by recognised stock exchanges and recognised clearing corporations only with the Authority's prior approval. Amendments to those bye-laws, and to constitutional documents concerning matters under the SCRA or the Market Infrastructure Institutions Regulations, also require prior approval.

Recognised stock exchanges must preserve prescribed books, account documents, and further specified records in electronic retrieval form for at least twenty years. Recognised clearing corporations are subject to the same retention format and period for governance minutes, clearing member and settlement account details, transaction and deposit records, margin information, accounting books, bank statements, and further specified records.

Equal, fair and transparent access to clearing and settlement services requires recognised clearing corporations to maintain and publish a non-discriminatory access framework. The framework must state the basis for shareholder stock exchange access and the requirements non-shareholder stock exchanges must satisfy to obtain access. Recognised stock exchanges and clearing corporations must provide equal, unrestricted and transparent access to all persons without favouring associates or related entities.

Utilization of profits and investments by a recognised stock exchange or recognised clearing corporation must comply with norms specified by the Authority. Deployment of funds generally requires prior approval. Treasury investments are exempt where they comply with a governing-board-approved investment policy. Activities involving fund deployment or otherwise unrelated or not incidental to market infrastructure functions may be undertaken through a separate legal entity, subject to the Authority's approval.

Recognised stock exchanges and recognised clearing corporations must maintain a Business Continuity Plan and a Disaster Recovery Site. The arrangements must preserve data and transaction integrity in the manner specified by the Authority from time to time.

Recognised stock exchanges providing co-location facilities must supervise and monitor them to maintain the integrity, security and privacy of data and trading systems. They must ensure equal and fair access for participants and publish quarterly reports on exchange-observed latencies on their websites.

A recognised stock exchange must maintain a procedure to halt trading in the market or an individual scrip in response to volatility or before major company-specific announcements. The trading-halt mechanism is intended to promote fair and orderly trading.

Recognised stock exchanges must establish detailed product-specific position-limit frameworks. Recognised clearing corporations must maintain risk management frameworks aligned with the CPMI-IOSCO Principles for Financial Market Infrastructures, adopt globally consistent margining practices, maintain sufficient capital for key risks, and conduct stress and liquidity testing. Eligible collateral includes cash, specified securities and gold, while cash and cash equivalents must constitute at least 50% of total liquid assets. Clearing corporations must also be ring-fenced from holding companies and maintain additional capital for orderly recovery or wind-down.

Trading hours for all product categories on recognised stock exchanges are determined on the basis of cost-benefit analysis, subject to a daily maximum of 23 hours and 30 minutes. Settlement must occur at least twice daily. Recognised stock exchanges and recognised clearing corporations must ensure that their risk-management systems and infrastructure remain commensurate with trading hours at all times.

Every recognised clearing corporation must establish and maintain a Settlement Guarantee Fund to guarantee settlement of trades executed on a stock exchange. The fund corpus must meet the prescribed minimum based on monthly stress-test value or USD 1 million, whichever is higher, and must be adequate to address clearing member defaults. Periodic stress tests must assess corpus sufficiency. An Authority-approved framework must govern contributions by clearing members, the clearing corporation and stock exchange, and provide for replenishment following a shortfall.

A recognised stock exchange must establish an Investor Education and Protection Fund in accordance with requirements specified by the Authority. This forms part of the general obligations applicable to recognised stock exchanges under the Market Infrastructure Institutions regulatory framework.

Admission of securities requires a recognised stock exchange or recognised clearing corporation to obtain the Authority's prior approval before introducing or offering settlement services for any new category of securities.

A recognised stock exchange must use a recognised clearing corporation for clearing and settlement of its trades under an agreement between them. It must also extend its arbitration mechanism to resolve disputes or claims arising from the clearing and settlement of trades executed on the exchange.

Recognised market infrastructure institutions must identify core and critical functions and organise them into Critical Operations; Regulatory, Legal, Compliance, Risk Management and Investor Grievances; and other functions, including business development. Functions and personnel within the regulatory, legal, compliance, risk management and investor grievances vertical must be ring-fenced from the other verticals. This replaces the earlier policy-based requirement for segregation of regulatory departments.

Recognised market infrastructure institutions must constitute functional committees, oversight committees and any further committees specified from time to time. The Authority determines the composition, quorum and functions of these committees. Effective 1 November 2024, the framework expressly identifies functional and oversight committees, replacing the earlier general requirement to establish committees as specified.