Retail investors may be staying away from the bourses, but online value-added services (VAS) provided by brokers have surged in terms of number of client accounts in the past few months.
Mumbai-based broking and finances services firm, India Infoline Ltd, which gets 70% of its trading volume through the online platform, has added a whopping 60,000 new clients in the last three months.
Apart from research reports in English, the firm recently started providing information in other regional languages to their online clients.
Other brokerages have also seen online subscriber base heading north. Sharekhan Ltd, which has around five lakh online clients that contribute around 70% of its volume, has registered more online subscribers.
Bonanza Portfolio, which caters to the retail segment, has also seen an increase of more than 90% in online clientile base.
Apart from research reports, clients are increasingly subscribing to a wide range of other online services.
Firms such as Sharekhan and Reliance Money have been providing charting and technical analysis, live market news, options calculators, online fund transfer through banks and recorded messages on stock calls in the past few months. These were well-received by online investors just as the value-added services doled out by telecom services to shore up subscription became popular.
Harshad Apte, vice-president, strategy and communication, India Infoline, said, “The online trading segment is growing by more than 17%. The trick lies in empowering clients with better accessibility to reports and other value-added services. The market condition may have subdued the confidence of the retail investor but with scores of VAS they are keeping themselves updated of the happenings in the markets. We have seen good online participation even in such bad market conditions. As the conditions improve, we might see higher well-informed participation by retail investors.”
Rakesh Goyal, head of distribution, Bonanza Portfolio, said, “There is no steep decline in the interest of retail investors. Going by numbers, one could fairly assume that the investor community still believes in the potential that Indian markets have.”