Will leverage tech to crack down on market manipulators, says SEBI chief  

SEBI plans to enhance market surveillance using AI, aiming to protect investors and deter fraud while ensuring market stability.

The Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) will enhance surveillance and enforcement on market manipulators and cyber fraudsters through technology and use Artificial Intelligence (AI) to widen the reach of its investor awareness programmes, its Chairman Tuhin Kanta Pandey told The Hindu in an interview. He said SEBI aims to have “optimum regulation” in the capital market without “irritating” the stakeholders – exchanges, investors, brokers – such that “the market functions with integrity”.

The SEBI chief said that ever since he assumed charge last year, SEBI has rolled out 58 initiatives to ease business processes in the capital market, nine broad initiatives to make the market investor-centric and educate investors to make better choices. SEBI has made four changes to strengthen the framework regulating market intermediaries such as exchanges. It has introduced 13 measures to develop the capital market and six regulations to cool down speculation and stabilise the equity derivatives segment, he said.

Also read | SEBI cracks whip on market manipulators

A lot of SEBI’s initiatives were technology-driven, said Mr. Pandey, highlighting the development of SEBI Check, a tool within the UPI interface that identifies registered intermediaries for investors before they make a payment. The tool is expected to rein in fraudulent brokers or traders who promise unreal gains to investors and dupe them.

The SEBI chief urged investors to be safe and be proactive while using these tools to identify cyber frauds. “If someone is approaching, people should say that ‘you are a fraud as your account does not show SEBI Check. I will lodge an FIR against you’,” he said, adding that people need to visit their broker’s office or bank branches at least once before making an investment.

He said SEBI is planning to run campaigns to popularise these tools as part of investor education initiatives. The market regulator has collaborated with Bengaluru-based AI company SARVAM to widen the reach of such efforts.