New Delhi, Feb 28 As the Indian stock market crashed on Friday on weak global cues, Zerodha CEO and Co-founder Nithin Kamath said they are facing business degrowth for the first time in 15 years.
In a post on X social media platform, Kamath said that the number of traders and overall trading volumes have dropped significantly by more than 30 per cent.
“Across brokers, there's a more than 30 per cent drop in activity. Combined with the true-to-market circular, we are seeing degrowth in the business for the first time since we started 15 years ago,” Kamath stated.
He added that the drying up of volumes shows how shallow the Indian markets still are. “The activity is more or less among those 1-2 crore Indians,” Kamath wrote on X.
The stock market tumbled as US President Donald Trump created a stir in the global markets with the announcement of trade tariffs.
Trump confirmed that new tariffs on imports from Mexico and Canada will take effect on March 4. Apart from this, the tariff on Chinese imports is also going to be doubled to 20 per cent.
According to Kamath, the decline in trading activity could impact government revenue from Securities Transaction Tax (STT).
He said that if the trend continues, STT collections in FY 2025-26 may fall below Rs 40,000 crore, which would be at least 50 per cent lower than the government's estimated Rs 80,000 crore.
“I've no idea where the markets go from here, but I can tell you about the broking industry. We are seeing a massive drop in terms of both the number of traders and volumes,” Kamath concluded.
During an intra-day low, the Sensex tanked nearly 1,430 points, or 1.9 per cent, to around 73,200.
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