E-Paper
IEX shares dip by nearly 10% as market coupling looms prior to earnings report
The crash occurred just before IEX's Q1FY26 earnings report, which is crucial for understanding regulatory implications.
Indian Energy Exchange (IEX) shares on July 24 hit a drastic low of almost 10 per cent to touch down their lower circuit on the Bombay Stock Exchange, priced at ₹169.10, down by 9.98 per cent as against its last closing price of ₹187.85 apiece.
The crash came after the Central Electricity Regulatory Commission (CERC) announced that it would begin implementing power market coupling in India, and hours before IEX's Q1FY26 results arrived.
CERC's power market coupling's first phase will involve coupling the Day-Ahead Market (DAM). India's power exchanges will be using a distinguished ‘round-robin’ mode to operate DAM by Jan 2026.
“Based on the submissions made by Grid-India and various consultations held... the Commission has decided to initiate the process for implementing market coupling in a phased manner,” said the CERC website.
What is power market coupling?
According to the staff paper released by CERC, power market coupling refers to the process where bids are collected from all the power exchanges and matched on the basis of their bid types.
The matching is done to discover the uniform market clearing price for the Day Ahead Market or Real-time Market or any other market as notified by the Commission. The phenomenon is subject to market splitting, which refers to the splitting up of electricity markets into regional price areas.
As of the present day, IEX is a dominant player among several other power exchanges, which operate independently. The phenomenon would be impacting market operations, settlement mechanisms, and trade volumes handled by these exchanges, said a report by The Economic Times.
The IEX is likely to be directly affected by the operational changes associated with market coupling.
How did IEX prices fluctuate before this?
IEX shares have crawled down by nearly 3.07 per cent, over the last one year, with a relatively flat rate for the past six months.
The shares had suffered a dip of about 6.21% on a year-to-date (YTD) basis. The share prices had lowered by 11.35 percent over the last three months and by 9.93 per cent since the last thirty days.
IEX's quarterly earnings for the first quarter of FY 2026
The crash came, hours before the Q1FY26 earnings of IEX, which is scheduled to be released in the later hours of the day.
The earnings are expected to be crucial for management commentary on the regulatory update, its operational implications, and the company’s preparedness for the phased implementation timeline, said a report by The Economic Times.
