Upper circuit is a system to curb excessive speculation in the stock market, applied by the stock exchange authorities, when the index spurts or plunges by more than a fixed limit. Trading is then suspended for some time to let the market cool down.
The market wide circuit breakers would be triggered by movement of either Sensex or the NSE S&P CNX Nifty whichever is breached earlier.
In case of a 10% movement of either of these indices, there would be a 1-hour market halt if the movement takes place before 1 p.m. In case the movement takes place at or after 1 p.m. but before 2.30 p.m. there will be a trading halt for 1½ hour. In case the movement takes place at or after 2.30 p.m. there will be no trading halt at the 10% level and the market will continue trading.
In case of a 15% movement of either index, there will be a 2-hour market halt if the movement takes place before 1 p.m. If the 15% trigger is reached on or after 1 p.m. but before 2 p.m., there will be a 1 hour halt. If the 15% trigger is reached on or after 2 p.m. the trading will halt for the remainder of the day.
In case of a 20% movement of the index, the trading will be halted for the remainder of the day.
Although introduced in November 1992, it was used for the first time in the Bombay Stock Exchange on Tuesday, 9 March 1993 when the Sensex declined by more than 5% from the opening level, i.e. from 2451.20 to 2318.26. At that time, the circuit was 5%.
This is primarily done to avoid the lay investor from incurring huge losses in the share market due to speculation. What happens when there are circuit filters is that trading is halted and then some sanity hopefully emerges and the stock market stops seeing an irrational one sided movement in the prices of shares.
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