Now shorter and simpler IPO form, says Sebi

MUMBAI: Market regulator SEBI on Thursday decided to introduce a new short and simple form for IPO investors for increasing retail participation in the stock markets.

"The present IPO form is not investor friendly. It takes a lot of time to understand it. Taking all this into account, the whole form has been changed and this will lead to reduction in the size of the form by about one-fourth," Sebi chairman U K Sinha said here.

Talking to reporters after the Sebi board meeting, he said the aim is to make the form simple and understandable for ordinary retail investor.

The Board also decided that the form would also carry information regarding the peer companies' Price-Earnings (PE) ratio and track record of lead managers of the IPO.

The application forms currently being used for bidding in initial public offers (IPOs) and follow-on public offers (FPOs) are long and require the investors to fill in some details that can be done away with.

Besides, these forms run into 15-20 pages in most cases, although there are only 2-3 pages where particulars need to be filled in by the investors.

The rest of the pages contain instructions, information about the company and the issue and details about bankers, registrars and bidding centres.

The Sebi Board also decided on a uniform KYC (know-your- customer) norms for different market players and accept 'Aadhar' or Unique Identity card as one of the document as identity proof for bidding in IPO and FPO.