Unregistered investment advisory case: Sebi invites refund claims from Cypress Money clients

Market regulator Sebi on Monday initiated the refund process for the clients of Cypress Money Investment Advisor, which collected fees through unregistered investment advisory as well as research analyst services.

Market regulator Sebi on Monday initiated the refund process for the clients of Cypress Money Investment Advisor, which collected fees through unregistered investment advisory as well as research analyst services. In a public notice, Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) has asked it to submit the refund claim by November 30.

According to Sebi, Cypress Money and its partners -- Anubhav Kandpal, Saumya Kala and Suman Kala --were providing investment advisory services and were also offering stock recommendations and technical and fundamental calls in form of research analyst services in exchange of consideration from October 2015 to June 2017. Through such services, a total of Rs 14.7 lakh as fees was collected from 90 clients. They were acting as investment advisors and research analysts without securing registration from the regulator.

Accordingly, the regulator, in May 2018, had barred Cypress Money and its partners from the securities market for at least three years and asked them to refund the fees collected from clients. However, they failed to refund the money to clients. Consequently, Sebi initiated the recovery proceedings in February 2019.

"Since the recovery proceedings have been concluded and the amount... has been recovered, therefore, it is decided to initiate the refund of fees to the eligible clients," Sebi said. Further, clients of the defaulters have been asked to submit application in a prescribed format to Sebi for refund of fees. The refund will be subject to verification of genuineness of claim.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)