There has been heated discussions, announcements over extension of Indian Stock Market Trading timings from the current 9:55AM to 3:30PM. The focus of the both the major exchanges, NSE & BSE, has been to start the market early i.e., at 9:00AM (as announced last week).
Most brokers esp. small brokers are opposing this since funds settlement is not possible at 8:30AM since most banks open after 9:00AM and the RTGS opens at 9:00AM only for any customer to transfer funds to the broker at the last moment.
NSE has been particular in starting early as it sees loosing market to Singapore Stock Exchange on NIFTY Futures which is also listed there.
Ideally the focus on extension of market timing must be the other way – extend from 3:30PM to 4:00PM or later. Closing markets later has it’s own issues like the back office work of brokers and depository participants gets extended but this is more affordable that opening early and putting everybody to difficulty as banking system will also have to overhaul itself. Closing later will not require any major changes from banks except for probably accepting cheques for clearing from the brokers.
So what is the advantage of having longer trading hours?
More time to trade or more time to speculate. More brokerage for brokers (well for the extended working hours). Other than this….. debatable…