Unlisted shares glossary
Reviewed by GrowFast's desk. General information, not advice.
The short answer
The terms below are the ones you will meet when buying or selling unlisted, pre-IPO and delisted shares in India, each defined in a sentence or two.
The shares
- Unlisted share: a share of a company that is not listed on a stock exchange.
- Pre-IPO share: an unlisted share of a company that is expected to list. It is a market term, not a legal one.
- Delisted share: a share of a company that was listed and has been removed from the exchange.
- ESOP: an employee stock option plan, under which employees can acquire shares in their company.
- Face value: the nominal value of a share stated in the company's records, such as Rs 10 or Rs 2. It is not the price.
- ISIN: the 12-character code that identifies a security, starting with IN for India. It tells your depository exactly which share is being transferred.
Holding and transferring
- Demat account: an account that holds your shares electronically, under the Depositories Act, 1996.
- Depository: NSDL or CDSL, the two institutions that hold securities in electronic form.
- Depository participant: the bank or broker through which you hold a demat account.
- Off-market transfer: a transfer of shares from one demat account to another that does not go through a stock exchange.
- Delivery instruction: the instruction a seller gives its depository participant to transfer shares, on paper or online.
- Stamp duty: a duty on the transfer of shares, 0.015% of the amount for a transfer in demat form.
Listing
- IPO: an initial public offering, the first sale of a company's shares to the public, after which they are listed.
- DRHP: the draft red herring prospectus, the draft offer document a company files with SEBI before an IPO. Filing it is not an approval.
- Lock-in: a period after listing during which certain shares cannot be sold.
- Offer for sale: the part of an IPO in which existing shareholders sell their shares.
- Delisting: the removal of a company's shares from a stock exchange, voluntarily or by the exchange.
Prices and tax
- Indicative price: a guide to the price at which a dealer would deal. It is not an offer.
- Fair market value: the value of a share worked out by the method in the tax rules, used to test whether a price is too low.
- Long-term capital gain: for unlisted shares, a gain on shares held for more than 24 months.
- KYC: know your customer, the identity checks a regulated firm must carry out before it deals with you.
- PAN: your permanent account number, which must be quoted for larger share transactions.
Sources
- Ministry of Corporate Affairs: Companies (Prospectus and Allotment of Securities) Rules, 2014, rules 9A and 9B
- Income-tax Act, 2025, section 197: tax on long-term capital gains
- SEBI: Issue of Capital and Disclosure Requirements Regulations, 2018 (lock-in of pre-issue capital), board memorandum of January 2026
- SEBI (Delisting of Equity Shares) Regulations, 2021
This guide is general information as the rules stood on 9 Oct 2026. Rules and tax rates change. It is not investment, legal or tax advice; check the sources and take professional advice before you act. See the Terms and Conditions.