According to the latest NSE Market Pulse report, the primary market hit the jackpot in August with 100 per cent listing returns as the retail investor base in the broader market expanded. IPOs and new registrations go hand in hand. New investors often register for an IPO in order to make a quick profit. While June and July were not the best months for IPO returns, August was exceptional.
Eighteen mainland IPOs raised ₹28,976 crore and have a market value of ₹2.48 trillion, 8.6 times the capital raised. Manipal Payment alone accounted for 32 percent of the monthly fund collection and 40.5 percent of the total market value; the top three received 51.6% of the money. The primary market registered 25 IPOs during the month, the highest in the last ten months.
All the top three gains were from small issues: Tempsens with 111.3% stake raised ₹650 crore, Technocraft with 81.4% stake raised ₹252 crore, Behari Lal with 63.2% stake raised ₹302 crore. The money went to large issues, and the profits went to small ones. Shares of Horizon Industrial Parks, the third-largest issue, added 0.4%.
The expansion of the IPO market has been largely driven by Western India. New registrations in the Western region grew by a whopping 40.9% month-on-month (MoM), significantly outpacing other regions. North India follows with a steady 12.4% rise in new investor inflows over the month. Meanwhile, East India recorded 7.3 per cent new registrations and South India 3.6 per cent.
Participation by individual investors expanded rapidly. New investor registrations on the NSE rose to 1.5 million in August from 1.3 million in July, representing a month-on-month growth of about 16.5 percent. The acceleration further extended the exchange’s enrollment growth, which previously rose 14.1 percent in June.
On the other hand, in August 2026, Gujarat overtook Uttar Pradesh as the largest source of new investor registrations, adding 230,000 investors, equivalent to 14.6 percent monthly additions. Uttar Pradesh comes next with 200,000 (12.9 percent).
In Gujarat, new registrations increased by 94.8 percent over the previous month and by 134.9 percent over last year. Rajasthan also recorded strong sequential growth of 36.7 percent. Change of leadership from Uttar Pradesh to Gujarat. Uttar Pradesh continues to have the second largest registered investor base in the country. A surge in new registrations in Gujarat made it the largest contributor to the increase in investor participation in August. This divergence highlights the changing dynamics of investor attraction, with states with already large investor pools increasingly joined by markets registering rapid growth in new participation.