At a time when India's GDP overtook the UK, the Indian stock market ushered in a new milestone in development.

As of August 31, there were 71.6508 million CDSL investor accounts and 28.8599 million NSDL investor accounts, meaning the total number of Demat accounts in India reached 100m for the first time in August. In March 2020, CDSL and NSDL had a total of 40.9 million investor accounts. Since the outbreak of COVID-19, as India's Mumbai sensitivity index and Nifty 100 index have risen 113 per cent and 118 per cent respectively, the number of Indian investor accounts has increased by nearly 60 million, or 144 per cent.

The Securities and Exchange Commission of India (SEBI) requires that anyone who wants to trade Indian securities must have an Demat account. Only the National Securities Depositary Co., Ltd. and the Central Depositary Service Co., Ltd., can approve the opening of Demat accounts.

The number of stock accounts in India exceeded 100 million for the first time.

As India's largest depository institution, CDSL had about 21 million separate accounts in March 2020 and exceeded 40 million for the first time in the third quarter of 2021, doubling in a year and a half, compared with nearly five years for India to increase from 10 million to 20 million accounts.

This year, CDSL continues to maintain rapid growth, registering about 16.05 million new investors. Among them, it increased by about 7.4 million in the first quarter, 5 million in the second quarter and 3.65 million investors in the third quarter. By comparison, there were about 26.7 million newly registered investors last year.

Analysts believe that at the beginning of the outbreak in March 2020, the pace of new investor accounts accelerated, when the blockade prompted investors to try to change their financial situation in stock trading. The popularity of smartphones in India in recent years has made it easy for investors in second-and third-tier cities and villages to enter the market. Indian retail investors currently account for 52 per cent of average daily turnover, while foreign portfolio investors (FPI) and domestic institutional investors (DII) account for 19 per cent and 29 per cent, respectively.

Low interest rates have also forced many people to shift their money to the stock market. In the more than a year since the outbreak, the Bank of India has cut interest rates seven times in a row, bringing them to a 10-year low. However, under persistent inflationary pressures, the Reserve Bank of India has raised interest rates three times this year, raising the latest annual interest rate from 4 per cent to 5.40 per cent, returning to its pre-COVID-19 level.

Total fund accounts 135 millionThe number of stock fund accounts exceeds 90 million.

As of June 30, there were a total of 1281 funds in India, with cumulative net assets under management of 35.64 trillion rupees, or about 3.11 trillion yuan, according to the Fund Industry Association of India.

As fast-growing as the Indian stock market is the fund industry. In May 2014, the asset management size of the Indian fund industry exceeded 10 trillion rupees for the first time and reached 20 trillion rupees for the first time in about three years. In November 2020, the scale of management exceeded 30 trillion rupees for the first time.

According to the classification of the Indian Fund Industry Association, Indian funds mainly include classified income and debt-oriented funds, growth / equity-oriented funds, mixed funds and so on.

Income and debt-oriented funds include ultra-short-term funds, money market funds, credit risk funds, Phnom Penh funds, 10-year fixed-term Phnom Penh funds, a total of 312 products, with a total net asset value of 12.34 trillion rupees under management. It is worth noting that India's money market funds are not outstanding, with a cumulative size of only 1.08 trillion rupees, accounting for only 3 per cent of the total size of the fund.

Growth / equity-oriented funds include bullish funds, market funds, large and medium-sized funds, medium-sized funds, small-cap funds, dividend income funds, value funds / hedge funds, theme funds, etc., with a net asset value of 12.86 trillion rupees under management, accounting for about 36% of the total size of the fund, or about 1.12 trillion yuan.

There are a total of 135mixed funds with a cumulative net assets under management of 4.7 trillion rupees.

The data show that growth / equity-oriented funds accumulated net inflows of 499.1 billion rupees in the second quarter and 630.5 billion rupees in the first quarter, estimated that Indian equity funds accumulated about 98.6 billion yuan in the first half of the year. At the same time, income and debt-oriented funds had a net outflow of 702.1 billion rupees in the second quarter and 1.1801 trillion rupees in the first quarter.

From the perspective of the number of fund investors, as of July 31, 2022, the total number of fund industry accounts was 135 million, and the total number of growth / equity-oriented fund accounts reached 90.25 million, accounting for the highest proportion. In recent years, the Indian people prefer to pursue high-risk and high-volatility stock funds.