In a first-of-its-kind initiative by a brokerage in India, Geojit Financial has launched a platform for Non-Resident External (NRE) and Non-Resident Ordinary (NRO) categories of investors to open online trading and demat account services through Central Depository Services Ltd (CDSL).

So far, brokerages were offering trading and demat account opening facilities to NRI account holders only as a single category.

An NRE account is a bank account opened in India for an NRI to park his foreign earnings while an NRO account is to manage the income earned by him in India. NRE and NRO account holders can now open trading and demat accounts in five minutes through the platform hello.geojit.com, enhancing wider participation by the Indian diaspora in the country’s stock market. At present, NRIs in the US and Canada will be unable to avail this online facility.

Through CDSL

“For the first time in India, Geojit has enabled the online opening of trading and demat account for NRE and NRO categories of Indians, entirely through CDSL. All that is required of a prospective participant is to have an Aadhaar linked mobile number and a PAN,” said Jones George, Chief Digital Officer, Geojit. The online account opening platform was developed by Geojit Financial’s subsidiary, Geojit Technologies and speaking about the product, its Executive Director, Anil Kumar, said, “We developed this platform as there are many non-resident Indians who are interested in investing in the stock markets but the delay in account opening is often a deterrent. Opening a trading and demat account offline takes several days whereas, if all documents are in place, an online account can be opened in five minutes. Now for the first time, all NRIs can start investing in the Indian stock markets in a few clicks.”

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