Listed companies face heat for violating disclosure norms

[Editor: The news below says that the NSE and the BSE have imposed fines or suspended trading in over 1,100 cases of non-compliance. But I do not find any usefulness of such moves, from the small investors point of view; who have put their hard earned cash, based on the assurances given by the regulators. Now if this is the type of regulation, where a share becomes illiquid, after being suspended, then I feel there is something wrong with this system, and needs to be re-looked closely. The point to be  noted here is that, the regulators are being paid from Tax Payers' hard earned money, so that the investors in these companies are protected, but if in the name of protection further problem is created for the shareholders, then it does not make any sense, isn't it? On the contrary, what is necessary, is to persecute or take to task those company officials, who are found to flout the norms set by the exchanges, by slapping civil/criminal cases of negligence against them (Tort law in India). Otherwise, I  feel, all these hackneyed exercises will not help much in retaining, either the confidence of the small investors or increase the number of traders / investors in the market] 

February 22, 2014: In a major crackdown against listed firms not complying with regulatory disclosure norms, NSE and BSE have imposed fines or suspended trading in over 1,100 cases of non-compliance, involving nearly 600 companies.

This is the first major crackdown by the stock exchanges after Sebi directed them late last year to put in place a "Standard Operating Procedure (SOP)" for dealing with listed companies not complying with the Listing Agreement.

Under this agreement, companies are required to submit documents like annual reports, shareholding pattern data, quarterly and full-year financial results, as also corporate governance compliance reports within stipulated time periods.

After finding hundreds of companies of not adhering to various provisions of this agreement, the regulator had asked the stock exchanges to put a stronger mechanism in place to ensure compliance.

Despite the new norms coming into effect from the quarter ended December 31, 2013, the exchanges have come across at least 1,107 cases of non-compliance by hundreds of companies for the three-month period.

A large number of such companies have been found to be non-compliant to the Listing Agreement disclosure norms on more than one count and have been imposed with multiple penalties.

According to available data, NSE has imposed fine on 32 companies, while it has suspended trading in shares of 117 companies.

On the other hand, BSE has imposed fine on 309 companies for late or non-disclosure of shareholding data, while 396 companies have faced action for delayed or no filing of corporate governance reports.

Besides, 255 companies have also been taken to task by BSE for non-compliance to provisions that require filing of audit report for reconciliation of share capital.

While the amounts of fine are not big -- a few thousands of rupees in most cases -- because of these being first non-compliance since the new rules came into place, the penalties would further increase for repeat offenders.

The companies found to be non-compliant to one or more provisions for disclosures required for the quarter ended December 31, 2013, include Consolidated Construction Consortium, Samtel, Crest Animation Studios, MVL, PTC India, LCC Infotech, NEPC India, Simplex Infrastructures, Jindal Poly Films, Zylog Systems, Clutch Auto and Birla Cotsyn.

These also include Amar Remedies, Ankur Drugs, Blue Bird India, Edserv Softsystems, Koutons Retail, SBI Home Finance, Taksheel Solutions, Teledata Technology Solutions, Anu's Laboratories, Akzo Nobel India, Samtel India, Amtek Auto, Amtek India, Arvind International, Hanung Toys, Nirlon Ltd, Venus Remedies, Birla Shloka Edutech, Asahi Infrastructure, Encore Software, Force Motors, Ind-Swift and Tulip Telecom.

Courtesy: The Business Standard