In March and April this year, around 1.2 million new investors opened demat accounts with the Central Depository Services (CDSL) despite the ongoing nationwide lockdown, as per a report by The Economic Times. Meanwhile, the report noted that the month of April saw NSE internet trading volume rise by 53 percent.
This is an indication of more and more retail investors in the country taking to equities as against the more traditional forms of investments (say in bank deposits, gold, etc).
Even as fiscal year 2020 saw a sharp fall in the markets, an increasing number of fresh investors signed up to have demat accounts opened. This, at a time when economic activity in the country has been at a standstill due to the nationwide lockdown in light of the COVID-19 pandemic.
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"I think falling of markets, good IPOs, lockdown, all put together, increased the appeal of capital markets for people," said Prakarsh Gagdani, CEO, 5paisa.com.
He said, "From February to March, we saw an 80 percent growth in our customer acquisition, opened around 60,000 accounts in the month of March."
He also pointed out that a lot of their customers are those who are opening such accounts for the first time, seeing this is an opportunity to make money.
A report by Mint citing data from the Securities and Exchange Board of India said the number of new demat accounts opened during FY2020 stood at 4.9 million, a 22.5 percent increase from the 4 million demat accounts opened in FY2019. This, the report noted, was the highest in at least a decade.
