Sebi bans 15 persons, suspects tax evasion

Markets regulator Sebi today barred 15 individuals from securities market on suspected tax evasion and money laundering through stock trading platforms.

New Delhi: Markets regulator Sebi on Monday barred 15 individuals from securities market on suspected tax evasion and money laundering through stock trading platforms.

This is on top of 108 entities already prohibited from the securities in December last year in a case related to Radford Global Limited.

These entities misused the securities market system to artificially increase price of the scrip for providing long term capital gain (LTCG) benefits to the preferential allottees of Radford.

In an order passed today, the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) has restrained 15 persons "from accessing the securities market and buying, selling or dealing in securities, either directly or indirectly, in any manner, till further directions."

According to Sebi, the sellers (15 persons) played a crucial role in increasing the price of the scrip.

" ... Sellers were also a part of the scheme, plan, device and artifice employed in relation to the scrip of Radford and described in the interim order dated December 19, 2014," Sebi Whole Time Member Rajeev Kumar Agarwal said in an order.

They played a crucial role in pushing the price of scrip of Radford to such high levels especially by controlling the supply of shares, Sebi said

"Their suspicious acts selling shares in miniscule quantities despite there being a huge demand, contributing to 100 percent trading volume on most of the days, placing trades in a manner so as to maintain the daily average volume and not letting the liquidity dry out by sequentially selling shares clearly show that their selling pattern was not normal and was prima facie directed towards pushing up the price of the scrip," it added.