text: February 25, 2021 / 11:47 AM IST
  Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) chairman Ajay Tyagi said that March 2020 witnessed the highest volatility in the markets adding that the current volatility (index) reading of more than 20 is high as compared to the last 5 years. However, the recovery has been "very fast."
  "Many global markets have been witnessing unprecedented market movements," Tyagi said in an address at the National Institute of Securities Markets. "There has been increasing direct participation of investors in equity markets. Share of individual proprietary trading has also gone up."
  SEBI chief noted that the increase in demat accounts from 4 to 5 crore took only 10 months as compared to 28 months for the incremental three to four crores. The share of individual Propriety trading has also increased.
  Talking about mutual funds, Tyagi noted that it saw the highest outflows in the month of December last year. "SIP inflows into equities have been constantly falling in recent months In the last three months Mutual funds have seen some outflows," he stated.
  The month of March 2020 when the country went into a complete lockdown due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the debt market witnessed massive redemptions. However, the month of January saw a reversal in credit risk schemes, SEBI chief said. Equity Assets Under Management (AUM) of Mutual Funds increased despite outflow due to MTM gains.
  Illustrating the confidence of Foreign Portfolio Investment (FPI) in the Indian equity markets, Tyagi said that the inflows have been the "highest ever." Investments of over $35 billion were made so far by the FPIs which made India the highest recipient of FPI inflows among equity markets this year.
  "Companies in India raised 6.5 lakh crore via bond market this year. Equity fund raising has also picked up now," Tyagi said.
  Speaking on the companies that went public in the last year, he said that the Initial Public Offering (IPO) saw a "good amount of subscription." One third of the IPOs were subscribed 100X and one IPO was subscribed 190X this year. He added that with the exception of 2 IPOs, all others are trading above the issue price.