JPMorgan Chase Bank and an investment fund managed by Singapore-based Sixteenth Street Capital have separately settled allegations of violating India’s foreign portfolio investor (FPI) regulations with the capital markets regulator, the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI).
The two settlement orders issued on March 20 by SEBI show that both parties had filed suo moto applications in their respective matters. After due process, the fund paid Rs 72.87 lakh (around $77,903), while the bank, as a designated depository participant (DDP), paid Rs 34.42 lakh (around $36,800).
According to SEBI’s order, the Cayman Islands-based fund was controlled by an overseas citizen of India (OCI) from December 31, 2020, to August 8, 2025. During this time, it made fresh purchases and sales of securities from January 1, 2021, to August 7, 2025.
The fund delayed reporting to its DDP by more than five years that its beneficial owner had received an OCI card. It even made an incorrect statement in its beneficial owner declaration in 2022 that no OCI exercised control over it.
The fund applied to the regulator to settle the matter without admitting or denying the findings. Between January and February this year, SEBI’s high-powered advisory committee and the panel of whole-time members reviewed the terms of settlement and approved them.
Sixteenth Street Capital is led by founder and CIO Rashmi Kwatra, a former partner at Prince Street Capital Management, where she focussed on investments in South and Southeast Asia.
JPMorgan Chase
JPMorgan, acting as a DDP, granted Category-II licences to four UK-based FPIs that were not listed in the register of regulated entities maintained by the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority.
In 2019, post a change in norms, the bank re-categorized these entities as Category-I FPIs, but didn’t identify that these were not regulated by the UK authority.
Meanwhile, FPI-Care Super Pty Ltd merged with FPI-Spirit Super effective November 1, 2024, and informed the DDP the same day. However, the bank advised the FPI to seek fresh registration only on December 6, 2024, and blocked its account for fresh purchases on December 9, 2024, a delay of 38 days.
Between November 1 and December 9, 2024, the FPI carried out 64 purchase transactions.
In its order, SEBI said, "Thus, by failing to reassess the eligibility of the FPI, including requiring it to seek fresh registration in a timely manner, and by permitting the FPI to continue making additional purchases even after being informed of a Type I material change requiring fresh registration, the Applicant (JPMorgan Chase Bank NA as the DDP)” failed to comply with FPI norms and regulatory directions.
