A faster approach

If you're wary of subscribing to an initial public offering (IPO) because you don't want to block your money for 12 days, market regulator Sebi is set to alleviate your concern. It plans to reduce the process time of IPOs by five days to a week.

So, if you are not allotted shares, you will get your money back in seven days. Over the past year, Sebi has been trying to decrease the IPO process time. It initially reduced it from 20 days to 12 days in April 2010 and now plans to further lessen it to seven days. Earlier the process used to take a long time due to the lengthy payment and settlement mechanism.

However, the introduction of Application Supported by Blocked Amount (ASBA) has helped to speed it up.