The states with highest number of equity investors

The current calendar year has seen a record number of new investors coming to the stock markets with each month witnessing over a million new accounts being created. More importantly, the recent past has seen investors coming from all corners of the country as each state has registered a healthy rise in the number of registered investors.

Data from BSE shows that only two states – Maharashtra and Gujarat – have more than a crore registered investors each, with Maharashtra occupying numero uno status with nearly 1.9 crore registered investors. Gujarat recently breached the one-crore mark with the current number of registered investors in the state pegged at 1.01 crore.

The top two states are followed by Uttar Pradesh (72.4 lakh registered investors) and the two southern states of Karnataka (52.5 lakh) and Tamil Nadu (49.7 lakh) that complete the top five positions.

Incidentally, there are a total of 16 states – excluding Maharashtra and Gujarat - that have more than 10 lakh registered investors each. Rajasthan, West Bengal, Delhi, Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Haryana, Telangana, Bihar, Kerala, Punjab, Odisha, Assam and Jharkhand each have over 10 lakh registered investors, as per BSE data.

Moreover, the states with the maximum number of registered investors have also witnessed a good rate of growth in the total number in the last one year even as the base was quite high.

Maharashtra, for instance, saw a 48 per cent rise in the number of investors in the last one year, while Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh registered a rise of 32 per cent and 77 per cent, respectively.

Meanwhile, Madhya Pradesh saw the number of registered investors double in the last one year with the growth rate pegged at nearly 104 per cent. Even Bihar registered a rise of 110 per cent.

Interestingly, the bottom five in terms of the number of registered investors include the islands of Andaman & Nicobar along with Lakshadweep. Giving them company at the bottom are Daman & Diu, Mizoram and also the Army Post Office.

Barring Assam, the rest of the north eastern states have less than a lakh investors each who invest in the stock markets.

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