Why D-Street operates on New Year's Day? Don't crib, we will work more days this year

NEW DELHI: Happy New Year! The first thought on the minds of everyone remotely linked to the Indian stock market this morning would be: why does Dalal Street operate on the New Year's Day, when 90 per cent of the markets globally take an off.

"Strange! Why can’t we have a holiday on January 1? What are we trying to prove?" Sunil Singhania, a market veteran, tweeted this morning, summing up the mood of the market.



Well, there is better news!

Calendar 2020 promises to make you work more on Dalal Street. The year will have lesser number of trading holidays, which means more trading hours and more work. The solace, if any, is that out of the fewer trading holidays, some are falling closer to weekends to give you a extended breaks, nine in all.

The BSE calendar for 2020 has 12 trading holidays, as many as you had in 2017, but far less than 17 you had in 2019 and 15 in 2018.

The Republic Day falls on a weekend. This makes Mahashivratri as the first trading holiday of 2020 on February 21.

Out of the 12 trading holidays of the year, nine fall either on a Monday or a Friday; that makes it nine three-day weekends. We have had seven of them in 2019 and only four in 2018.

The once-in-a-year Muhurat Trading will take place on a Saturday this year (on November 14). It fell on a Sunday (October 27) during the year gone by.

These holidays are valid for equity, equity derivatives and security lending and borrowing (SLB) segments.