Shares of Indian Energy Exchange (IEX) fell 7% on January 9 in a highly volatile session after APTEL deferred hearing on market coupling norms to January 19.
On January 9, IEX shares on NSE closed 7% lower at Rs 139.19 apiece as Electricity Appellate Tribunal (APTEL) asked IEX to file affidavit by January 19 on amendments sought to the coupling norms.
The Central Electricity Regulatory Commission (CERC) lawyer told the tribunal that market coupling will be implemented only through regulation.
CERC lawyer has sought more time to respond on withdrawal of coupling order, reported CNBC-TV18.
The tribunal has also directed Central Electricity Regulatory Commission to submit the order passed by the Securities and Exchange Board of India in a week and disclose the actions taken against CERC officers mentioned in the SEBI order.
Earlier on January 9, CERC issued a circular that July 2025 order on market coupling stays.
July 2025 order shall be read as directions, said CERC.
ET Now reported that, at the hearing, the bench said it wants to be sure that CERC functioned in a fair manner, adding that the bench wants to be sure that CERC has acted independently.
"All we know is that CERC will not implement this system till regulations are made. We don't even know if and over what time regulations would be made. Once regulations are made, exchanges can always challenge if they have concerns," the tribunal observed, reported CNBC-TV18.
Market coupling is an economic model used in energy markets to create a single, uniform price for electricity across different trading platforms or exchanges, diluting IEX's dominant position.
On January 6, the tribunal had questioned how the market coupling rules were formulated. APTEL had remarked that CERC should have acted independently while drafting the framework.
"The theatrics are a cause of concern; regulation could have been done quietly by CERC. Expect CERC to be independent and above suspicion like Ceaser’s wife. If there is something amiss, we'd like to enquire and take action to avoid a repeat," the tribunal further observed, reported CNBC-TV18.
What are CERC coupling norms?
In July 23, 2025, CERC issued directions for implementing Market Coupling under the provisions of the Central Electricity Regulatory Commission (Power Market) Regulations, 2021. The implementation of this mechanism was expected to negatively impact the trading volumes on IEX, following which the stock fell 30% the next day.
There are two modes of trading on power exchanges: the real-time market (RTM) and the day-ahead market (DAM). According to a CERC order, starting January 2026, Grid-India will aggregate energy prices across all power trading platforms and publish a single unified price, a process known as day-ahead market coupling. The order said this mechanism would improve the efficiency of power exchanges and strengthen market participants’ confidence in exchange operations.
At present, electricity trading takes place on the market leader IEX, Power Exchange of India, and Hindustan Power Exchange of India. IEX dominates the market with an overall share of about 85% and a near-total presence in key segments such as DAM and RTM. Currently, buyers and sellers place bids independently on each exchange, resulting in separate price discovery across the three platforms.
With market coupling, a single market-clearing price will apply across all exchanges. The exchanges will only gather bids and forward them to a designated agency responsible for determining the common price. As a result, market coupling removes the advantage of trading on the dominant exchange, as bidders would have little incentive to prefer IEX over the other platforms.
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