Today ITDC hit UC but it was up around 10% 2 days ago, seems like someone or more than one were or was already having news of specific disinvestment. Isn’t this illegal?
I am asking this because I also bought ITDC on monday but sold it yesterday at cost.
It can be a insider trading. All big boys in markets know these news very early and they act accordingly. We are small retailers who get trap in every single one of them. BTW Insider Trading is illegal and SEBI will act Accordingly if anyone found Guilty.
After looking at the BSE & NSE volumes, on 8th March (Monday), there was indeed more than the usual trading activity in that scrip -
A business channel had attributed Monday’s increase to the rise in hopes of disinvestment. Also, there was a pre-market buy recommendation done by a regional business channel on Monday. The spike on Monday happened around 2 PM.
The impact on trading volumes after a stock is recommended on TV channels has become known after SEBI analyzed it in the recent CNBC anchor order (SEBI Report - Page 31-32) -
The stock hitting the upper circuit on 10th March is likely because of a single news report which suggested that the disinvestment process had moved forward. Likely in the coming days, we will know if this was just a rumor or something has actually happened as the exchanges (NSE, BSE) will ask for clarification about that news report from the company.
Another reason why there might have been such a wild price move could be because of the very low float in the stock. Of the total 8.57 Crores shares, only around 18.5-20 lakh are available for trading, and the rest are held by institutions/promoters (that likely don’t trade). Such low float might have also contributed to the abnormal price rise (like it has happened with many companies) because of people following the classic strategy of “Buy the Rumour, Sell the News”.
If there was insider trading and the person did it in their own name itself, then they will likely be in trouble because an insider in this company would likely be a government employee and they aren’t allowed to speculate in stocks (A support page about this). Also, SEBI (Prohibition of Insider Trading) Regulations, 2015 would become applicable to them.
Also, If there was any kind of unusual trading on the 8th March 2021, exchanges will likely ask for clarification about such trades (There is a support page about this in Zerodha’s Support Portal).
Whether Monday’s trading volume increase was due to insider trading or not, we will only know about that many years from now (Like a few hours ago, a news story mentioned about an insider trading case of 2015 being settled. That case was being probed from around 2017)
