Six of 10 brokers add active investors in January; Groww leads with 3.5 lakh, highest in over a year

Brokers see active investors grow in January

• Groww added 3.5 lakh active investors in January, its highest in 15 months
• Total NSE active investors grew by only 3 lakh, favouring top brokers
• Stricter rules and higher taxes reduce retail interest in derivatives.

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Six out of the top 10 brokers added active investors in January on the National Stock Exchange (NSE), with Groww adding 3.5 lakh investors, its highest addition in more than 15 months.

Groww, the country's largest broker by active investors, saw its customer base touch almost 1.25 crore at the end of January 2026, around double that of its nearest competitors.

However, the total active investors in NSE grew only by 3 lakh, showing a consolidation in favour of the top brokers. Investors who have traded at least once in 12 months are considered active as per NSE.

Interestingly, the country’s largest broker by revenue, Zerodha, saw its active investors grow by 10,000 in January after a 12-month decline. Mumbai-based Angel One saw its active investors decline by 13,000 during the month.

Bengaluru-based Zerodha has seen its active investor count drop by around 11 lakh over the last year. Publicly-listed Angel One also saw its active investors drop by around 10 lakh in 2025.

After several months, ICICI Securities, a full-service broker, surpassed Mumbai-based discount broker Upstox, adding 20,000 investors in January to reach a cumulative investor figure of 20.5 lakh.

The top broking firms have collectively added nearly a crore new active investors in 2024, and the losses in 2025 constitute a small percentage of their overall user base.

The stricter regulatory measures include tighter margin requirements, reduced weekly expiries, higher capital thresholds, and increased taxation, making derivatives trading significantly less attractive to retail investors. The recent move to increase the STT tax is also expected to deter speculative trading in futures and options (F&O).

According to a broker, some of the investor growth has been driven by Gold ETF investors over the last three months as the yellow metal has touched historic highs, though the gold price has been highly volatile since 2026.

Bank-backed traditional full-service brokers have continued to see the addition of active investors even during the last six months. These include HDFC Securities, ICICI Securities, Kotak Securities and SBICap Securities.