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Mint TOTM: The intriguing proposition that is the NSE IPO
A smaller-than-expected NSE IPO arrives on Dalal Street today, at a discount to rival BSE Ltd. on FY26 PE multiples.
The National Stock Exchange of India Ltd.’s much-awaited IPO opens today, marking the culmination of a decade-long wait for India’s largest stock exchange to list on Dalal Street. The journey hasn’t been without controversy, until the last day.
The ₹22,569 crore NSE IPO is an intriguing proposition. At ₹1,700-1,785, NSE shares are being offered at roughly 30% discount to rival BSE Ltd. on price-to-earnings, despite being nearly three times its size. The discount reflects a complicated reality: NSE’s dominant derivatives business is recovering, yet its growth has slowed sharply.
The issue, a pure offer for sale, was initially expected to raise ~ ₹30,000 crore by offloading 6% stake but shrunk in size as institutional shareholders led by Morgan Stanley reduced their stake sales in a “show of confidence” of future growth. On Wednesday, the likes of Goldman Sachs to HSB participated in the anchor book to raise as much as ₹6,746 crore.
The pricing has nonetheless generated interest. The upper end of the price band is about 6% below NSE’s latest unlisted-market price of around ₹1,900, while grey-market activity suggests a possible 11-12% listing premium.
On FY26 earnings, NSE’s price-to-earnings multiple is about 43, compared with 56 for BSE, making the offer look a lot cheaper. But looking only at past earnings can be misleading.
Net profit of India’s largest stock exchange rose 7% year-on-year on the back of 13% revenue growth in Q1 FY27. That compares with a 3% decline in topline in FY26. In comparison, BSE reported much stronger momentum, with revenue and profit both growing 62% in the April-June quarter. Its options premium turnover nearly doubled year-on-year, while NSE’s rose 14%. In July and August, BSE’s options premium turnover grew 61%, against just 7% for NSE.
That shift is central to the NSE IPO story. F&O transactions accounts for more than 60% of NSE’s operating revenue, making the exchange particularly sensitive to F&O volumes. Its share of the equity options premium market fell to 68.5% in Q1 FY27 from nearly 97% in FY24 after SEBI limited exchanges to one weekly index expiry. BSE used the change to capture liquidity that had previously been concentrated at NSE.
The recovery is now facing another test. NSE’s total derivatives turnover fell to ₹33.5 trillion in August after SEBI introduced the closing auction session for the lowest level since November 2023. SEBI has since proposed changes to the mechanism. Tighter bank guarantee rules could also raise capital requirements for brokers and constrain some high-frequency trading strategies.
Still, analysts see regulatory changes as a reset rather than the end of F&O business. Estimates put NSE’s FY27 derivatives growth anywhere between a 5% contraction and 3% growth, with 8-12% growth possible in FY28 and FY29 if volumes stabilise.
NSE also has steadier businesses in co-location, connectivity, data feeds and index licensing. These generated ₹1,956 crore in FY26 and have grown 18% annually since FY24. But they contribute less than 12% of revenue, leaving the exchange dependent on trading activity for much of its earnings.
For investors, the NSE IPO is therefore not simply a chance to buy into a dominant exchange at a discount. It is a test of whether NSE can regain growth momentum after regulation changed the market that made it so dominant in the first place.
The journey has been unusually long. NSE first filed IPO papers in 2016, but the plan was shelved after the co-location controversy and leadership overhaul. After settling with SEBI for ₹1,300 crore in January 2026, the exchange received approval to refile. The decade-long IPO journey is finally at Dalal Street today.
The imposition of a charge on payments to merchants made using UPI has evoked wide disappointment. As the government has emphasised, sellers must bear this fee, not buyers. Transactions of up to ₹2,000 are exempt, while the rest (barring a few special categories) will have to part with a 0.4% levy with a cap of ₹300. This will be shared by the payment apps and the banks hosting the accounts at both ends of the transfer.
The rules also leave person-to-person payments charge-free. The fee is nominal, and while merchants may or may not sneakily raise prices to make up for it, it’s vital that this platform can sustain itself and isn’t starved of funds needed for cybersecurity and upgrades.
This is also the right time to popularise the central bank’s digital currency, the e-rupee, as an alternative. Although UPI is convenient, it involves banks. e-Rupee wallets run by the RBI could let it work like cash, free of intermediary risk, since it has the same financial status as an ‘IOU’ issued directly by the monetary authority.
Also, the underlying technology of such digital currencies holds the potential to make it the money of the future, globally, and we must keep up.
The board of Tata Sons Pvt. Ltd. meets today amid a sharp divide over its future. Noel Tata, representing the majority shareholder Tata Trusts, is expected to oppose any extension for Chairman N. Chandrasekaran, whose term ends in February.
The meeting comes days after the Reserve Bank of India ordered Tata Sons to list publicly, adding urgency to a leadership question already complicated by growing differences among Tata Trusts trustees.
India’s smartphone market is heading for its weakest festive quarter in a decade, with sales volumes projected to plunge 25% to 36 million units from 48 million last year.
A global memory-chip crunch has pushed device prices sharply higher, squeezing the crucial under- ₹15,000 segment and prompting buyers to delay purchases or opt for refurbished phones. Even Apple Inc. has raised iPhone prices in India and cut discounts, adding to retailers’ concerns.
An agonising 33 km/hr cross-state drive along National Highway 66 lays bare the choked roads, delayed projects, and debt trap threatening Keralam’s economic future. Read more.
India’s 300 MW Bharat Small Modular Reactor is moving towards commercialisation, with Bhabha Atomic Research Centre in talks with NTPC Ltd., Adani Group, Reliance Industries Ltd. and Larsen & Toubro Ltd. on a potential private-sector partnership. The project could eventually scale to 30 GW, a significant chunk of India’s 100 GW nuclear target for 2047. But high costs, regulatory hurdles and the need for manufacturing scale remain key challenges.
Ola Electric Mobility Ltd.’s payments to Chairman Bhavish Aggarwal’s AI company Krutrim nearly quadrupled to ₹100 crore in FY26, including ₹46 crore advanced for services not yet invoiced. While the company says the transactions were compliant and at arm’s length, governance experts have questioned whether overlapping directors can independently assess the deals. The payments rose even as Ola Electric’s overall expenses nearly halved.
42.74%: The projected share of Indian households earning at least ₹8 lakh a year by FY31, up from 34.38% in FY26, according to the NSE RHP.
₹75: The new hallmarking fee per gold article payable by jewellers, raised from ₹45 by the Bureau of Indian Standards, effective 14 September 2026.
NZ$125 million: The estimated amount New Zealand’s kiwi fruit industry expects to save in tariffs over five years after the free trade agreement with India is implemented.
5%: The unemployment rate in India in August, as rising urban joblessness was offset by falling rural unemployment, according to the latest Periodic Labour Force Survey bulletin.
£1 billion: The total annual amount British workers spend of their own money on AI tools to assist them in their jobs, according to a Deloitte survey.
$44.8 million: The cost to hire a crude carrier to ship 2 million barrels from the US Gulf Coast to China amid escalating Middle East supply disruptions, according to Baltic Exchange data.
$38 billion: The estimated cost of the US war with Iran to the Department of Defence through 1 August 2026, according to the US Congressional Budget Office.
India's exports to its top market, the United States, rose 21.8% year-on-year to $8.3 billion in August 2026. Among its Top 5 markets, exports to the UAE saw a sharp decline while more than doubled to Singapore.
Standing as a stylised abbreviation of ‘Extreme Performance System’, the very first XPS line was launched in 1993 as desktops, followed by the first XPS laptops in 2004. The 1990s was massive for laptops—the idea of a mobile PC was an imperative for corporate and business leaders. In India, desktop PCs were only just breaking out as household products through early adopters. Read more.
On this day in 1948, the Nizam of Hyderabad, Mir Osman Ali Khan, agreed to the accession of Hyderabad to the Indian Union, ending the princely state’s brief attempt to remain independent after British rule ended in 1947. The decision came after Indian military action, known as Operation Polo, which began on 13 September. Hyderabad was then integrated into India, ending the Nizam’s rule over one of the largest and wealthiest princely states in the subcontinent.
Siddharth is a journalist with over seven years of experience. At Mint, he works at the intersection of editorial strategy and audience growth. Over the past 2.5 years, he has led and written two newsletters, curated the homepage, managed push notifications, and played a key role in shaping strategies to deepen subscriber engagement, improve retention, and expand digital reach across platforms.<br><br> He previously worked with Reuters, where he curated global news, and The Economic Times, where he tracked India’s startup ecosystem, building a strong foundation in business and financial journalism. His work today focuses on how stories are discovered, consumed, and retained in a fast-changing media landscape, combining editorial judgement with a sharp understanding of audience behaviour and evolving consumption patterns.<br><br> Siddharth holds a bachelor’s degree in humanities from Azim Premji University, Bengaluru, and a postgraduate diploma in journalism from the Asian College of Journalism. His approach is rooted in a simple idea: get the facts to people as clearly, accurately, and accessibly as possible, without losing nuance or depth. Based in Bengaluru, he is particularly interested in long-form storytelling and is keen to explore video journalism as a new format. Outside work, he enjoys watching video essays, following digital storytelling trends, and exploring maps.