No demat charges from February 1

MUMBAI, JAN. 28. As the first step of rationalising the charge structure for dematerialisation of shares, the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), today decided that no investor should be required to pay any charge towards opening of a Beneficiary Owner (BO) account and for credit of security into the account. Further no custody charge also should be levied on any investor, who would be opening a BO account on or after February 1. With effect from April 1, the custody charges would not be levied on any investor. However, the depositories may levy and collect the charges towards custody from the issuers, on a per folio (ISIN position) basis as the end of the financial year. The issuers would be required to pay custody charges to the depository with whom they have established connectivity based on the total number of folios as on March 31 of the previous financial year or the minimum amount, as the case may be by April 30 of the each financial year.