The Finance Bill, 2019 has given the SEBI new powers to act against entities that tamper or destroy electronic databases or fail to furnish information when sought by the capital markets regulator.
About:
As per the Finance Bill, 2019, a new section — 15HAA — has been inserted in the SEBI Act.
According to it, if a person tampers with information to obstruct an investigation or destroys regulatory data then the entity could be penalised up to ₹10 crore or three times the unlawful gains, whichever is higher.
SEBI can now also impose penalties of up to ₹1 crore on brokers for certain violations.
Background:
These new powers assume significance as SEBI is in the midst of probing the leak of sensitive data through WhatsApp and also recently passed fresh orders on the National Stock Exchange (NSE) co-location matter, which had been challenged at the Securities Appellate Tribunal (SAT).
Incidentally, the WhatsApp leak case or even the NSE co-location matter deal with the data being leaked through electronic means and unauthorised access to exchange data, which forms the base in most regulatory probes.
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