[Gaurav Pingle is practising company secretary and can be reached at [email protected]] With an intention to regulate limited liability partnerships (‘LLPs’) more stringently, the Ministry of Corporate Affairs (‘MCA’) issued a notification dated February 11, 2022 (‘MCA Notification’) whereby certain provisions of the Companies Act, 2013 are now applicable to LLPs. The said amendment falls...
Directors’ Liability and Climate Risk in India
Climate change has garnered significant attention given that it poses a serious challenge to sustainable development. No longer is it merely within the domain of voluntary conduct on the part of corporations. Instead, it is a material financial risk that corporations encounter, thereby imposing duties on the boards of directors of corporations to recognise and address climate risk. In “Directors’...
Climate Change – A Ticking Clock for Investors?
[Insaf Ahmad TK and Mathangi K are third-year undergraduate law students at Gujarat National Law University, India] The year 2019 witnessed the bankruptcy of Pacific Gas and Electric Corporation which the Wall Street Journal described as a “climate change bankruptcy”. The investors in Pacific Gas and Electric Corporation incurred losses worth millions of dollars due to a series of wildfires in...
SEBI Circular on COVID-19 Disclosures
That the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on a company’s business, operations and finances is “material” is undisputed. A question, however, arises whether listed companies ought to make clear and full disclosures of such impact and, if so, under what regime. One option would be to rely on existing securities regulation that requires listed companies to make episodic as well as periodic...
Disclosure of Loan Defaults by Listed Entities
Readers may recall the controversy surrounding a circular that the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) issued in August 2017 to all listed companies requiring them to make a public disclosure to the stock exchanges within one working day of defaulting on loans and other financial facilities. In a blog post then, I had discussed the rationale for SEBI’s move. However, the circular came...
SAT Rules on “Materiality” of Disclosures
A somewhat peculiar fact situation arose for consideration of the Securities Appellate Tribunal (SAT) in Electrosteels Limited v. Securities and Exchange Board of India (order dated 14 November 2019). Electrosteel Limited (ESL) embarked upon an initial public offering (IPO) in 2010. ESL’s parent is Electrosteel Castings Limited (ECL), a public listed company. Since iron ore is an essential raw...
Disclosure Requirements Under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code: SEBI’s Proposed Amendments
[Mallika Sen is a 2nd year B.A. LL.B. (Hons.) student at the National Law School of India University, Bangalore and Rudresh Mandal is a 3rd year B.A. LL.B. (Hons.) student at the NALSAR University of Law, Hyderabad. Introduction On March 28, 2018, the Securities and Exchange Board of India (‘SEBI’) released a discussion paper on compliance with SEBI regulations by listed entities undergoing the...
Understanding the Dichotomy between Materiality and Price Sensitivity: Where to Draw the Line?
[Anuj Bansal is a 5th year B.A. L.L.B. (Hons.) student at the Dr. Ram Manohar Lohiya National Law University, Lucknow] The approach of the securities law adjudicatory bodies, as observable through the orders on insider trading, has often given rise to an interesting issue of much academic relevance: what distinguishes ‘price sensitive information’ under SEBI (Prohibition of Insider Trading)...
SEBI Requires Disclosure of Loan Defaults
Over the last couple of years, there has been a steady regulatory move to create some connections between the banking system and the capital markets in order to address cases of loan defaults by companies, especially those listed on the stock exchanges. Take the case of wilful defaulters, who are effectively now kept out of the capital markets (as discussed here on this Blog). Another mechanism...
Non-Disposal Undertaking and its Reporting in the Indian Securities Market
[Guest post by Divyajyot Verma, a student at the Jindal Global Law School] Non-Disposal Undertakings (or agreements) (“NDUs”) are signed usually by the debtor in favour of the lender in relation to any loan obligation undertaken by the debtor. An NDU helps in ensuring that the debtor does not transfer the shares held by it in a company by way of outside arrangements such that the creditor is left...
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