SEBI v. Guiness Securities Limited (stock broker registration cancelled, 2023)
Judgment entered
Checked against the primary document on October 9, 2026. The library's summary, tags and figures for this record were compared with the regulator's own document by an AI model (Claude) following written instructions, in a single reading of the order; an independent second reading of 60 SEBI records agreed on every field for 56, the four misses being penalty amounts; a later sample of 50 of the SEBI records added on 9 October agreed on every field for 46. No lawyer has reviewed them. A checked record can still contain errors, and checked does not mean endorsed. See how we check records or report a correction.
In September 2023 a SEBI chief general manager cancelled the stock broker registration of Guiness Securities Limited, finding it had misappropriated client securities, sold them without the clients' knowledge, diverted the proceeds and falsified its books. The order finds fraud under the PFUTP Regulations and imposes no monetary penalty.
The record
| Agency | SEBI (India) |
|---|---|
| Date filed | 2023-09-07 |
| Date resolved | 2023-09-07 |
| Court | SEBI executive director / chief general manager |
| Status | judgment |
| Asset class | equities |
| Instruments | client securities held by a stock broker |
| Venue | NSE, BSE |
| Criminal parallel | No |
| Bars imposed | stock broker registration cancelled |
| Defendants | Guiness Securities Limited |
| Also named elsewhere | Guiness Securities Limited |
| Techniques |
What was ordered
- Civil penalty
- —
- Disgorgement
- —
- Prejudgment interest
- —
- Total relief
- —
- Alleged gain
- —
What is alleged to have happened
This order of 7 September 2023 was made under the intermediaries regulations against Guiness Securities Limited (GSL), a stock broker, depository participant and research analyst. It follows an NSE inspection and SEBI report of November 2018, an interim order of December 2018 confirmed in July 2019, forensic audits ordered by the exchanges, and the June 2022 final order on GSL and its directors and related entities, which is the subject of a separate record in this library.
In this enquiry a designated authority issued a show cause notice in August 2022 asking why action under the intermediaries regulations should not follow. SEBI's case was built on the forensic audit of the broker's books for 2015 to 2018 and of related entities back to October 2008. One audit report said the auditor could give no opinion because GSL did not cooperate.
The order finds that GSL held clients' securities in a fiduciary capacity without authority to move them, sold them without the owners' knowledge and diverted the proceeds for its own benefit. It also finds that GSL misreported data to the exchange under its enhanced supervision rules, overstated assets and liabilities, falsified client holding statements and receivables and payables, and failed to give SEBI the documents it asked for. These acts were held to be fraud and falsification of records in breach of regulations 3(d), 4(1) and 4(2)(p) of the PFUTP Regulations and section 12A of the SEBI Act. The order notes that both exchanges had declared GSL a defaulter and expelled it from May 2019.
Agreeing with the designated authority's recommendation, the order cancels GSL's stock broker registration with immediate effect. No monetary penalty is imposed in this order.
The record does not show whether GSL appealed, the amount of client losses or any recovery for clients.
This library has no technique that fits a broker's misuse of client assets, so the matter is tagged with none. The tagging is ours, not the regulator's.
For the regulator's own account of the facts, read the primary document linked above. This page deliberately summarises the structured record rather than reproducing the order.
Timeline
- 2023-09-07 SEBI order
Primary documents
Everything on this page derives from the documents below. Where our summary and the primary document disagree, the primary document is right.