How to Buy Shares in Nepal
Updated 25 October 2026 · Nepsense Markets
Buying shares on NEPSE needs three accounts, and each one does one job. A demat account holds your shares electronically. MeroShare is where that ownership lives online, where you apply for IPOs and check your portfolio. Your broker's trading terminal (the TMS) is where you actually place buy and sell orders. Do it in the right order and the whole setup takes under a week and costs a few hundred rupees.
One rule shapes everything that follows: NEPSE is a delivery-based market. Your trade settles two trading days after you make it, and you can't sell shares that haven't settled. That means no same-day trading — buy on Monday, and the shares are yours on Wednesday, provided no holiday lands in between. Everything in this guide is built around that reality. The rules and fees below are current as of October 2026.
Here's the three-account stack at a glance:
| Account | What it does | Where you get it | Cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Demat | Holds your shares; gives you your 16-digit BOID | Any Depository Participant — your own bank is easiest | Rs 100–200 a year; opening is often free |
| MeroShare | IPO applications, portfolio view, share transfers | CDSC's portal | Rs 50 registration + Rs 50 a year |
| Broker / TMS | Buying and selling on NEPSE | A SEBON-licensed broker | Free to open; commission only on trades |
If you only want to apply for IPOs, you can stop at the demat, the CRN and MeroShare — no broker needed. If you want to buy and sell listed shares, you need all three. Most people open everything at once. It takes no extra time, and it means you're not scrambling to open a broker account on the day you finally want to sell.
What you need before you start
Four things, all ordinary: citizenship (original plus copies of both sides), two passport photographs, a bank account in your own name, and a mobile number plus email in your own name. A PAN card is optional for opening a demat but worth getting before you trade seriously.
One warning here saves most of the trouble beginners hit: your name must appear identically on your citizenship, your bank account and every form you sign. A mismatched name is the most common reason applications get rejected and shares fail to credit. Use your full legal name everywhere, even if your bank knows you by a nickname.
Step 1: Open a demat account with a DP
A demat account is your share locker, opened through a Depository Participant (DP) — a bank, a capital company, or a brokerage licensed by CDSC. Your own bank is the easiest first choice because it already has your KYC. Most major banks now offer online opening; otherwise it's a 15-minute visit to the branch.
Fill the beneficiary owner form, sign with a signature that matches your citizenship exactly, and pay the opening fee. Many DPs run free opening periods. The annual maintenance charge is around Rs 100 to 200, and you pay it every year to keep the account active.
Within one to three working days you get your BOID: 16 digits, the first eight identifying your DP and the last eight identifying you. It's your permanent identity in Nepal's capital market, used for IPO applications, trading and transfers. Keep it private, and note that you can hold at most two demat accounts.
Step 2: Get your CRN for C-ASBA
Before you can apply for an IPO, your bank account has to be tied to your demat. That tie is the CRN (Client Registration Number), issued by your bank's C-ASBA desk. Ask for it by name — the CRN is not your account number. It's free at most banks and takes minutes.
Here's what C-ASBA actually does: when you apply for an IPO, the application amount is blocked in your bank account, not debited. Not allotted? The block releases. Allotted? The money goes and the shares arrive. Banks charge a small per-application fee, typically Rs 5 to 25. Without the CRN linked in MeroShare, every IPO application you try will fail — it's the step people skip.
Step 3: Register on MeroShare
MeroShare is CDSC's online portal, and it's where you apply for IPOs, view your portfolio and authorize share transfers. Register at meroshare.cdsc.com.np — bookmark the address rather than clicking search results, because fake MeroShare sites are an active problem.
Registration costs Rs 50, and renewal is Rs 50 a year; miss the renewal and you can't apply for IPOs. You'll register with your BOID, verify by OTP, then be told to change the default password. Do it immediately, and set your six-digit transaction PIN while you're there. That PIN authorizes shares to leave your demat when you sell — set it now, not on the day you're trying to exit a position.
Step 4: Open a broker (TMS) account
You can't buy listed shares without a broker. Choose a SEBON-licensed one (the regulator's site lists them), and check the license before you hand over documents. Opening the account is free; you pay commission only when you trade. Take your citizenship, BOID and bank details, and you'll get your TMS login within a few working days.
Which broker you pick matters less for price — commission is regulated — and more for platform quality and support. Test the mobile app before you commit. The TMS is where you'll actually trade, so a bad platform costs you more than a good one saves.
Step 5: Fund your account and place your first buy order
Money moves from your bank to your broker by transfer into the broker's account. Leave a buffer: a Rs 10,000 buy actually needs about Rs 10,200 once commission and the SEBON fee are counted, and an order is rejected if your balance doesn't cover it. Some brokers offer margin or collateralised buying on top of cash. Treat that as an advanced tool — with the 15% daily limit, a leveraged position can move 15% against you in a single day.
In the TMS, search for the scrip by its symbol, enter the quantity and the price, and use a limit order, not a market order. On a thin book, a market order can fill at a price you didn't want.
NEPSE trades Monday to Friday, 11:00 to 15:00 NPT — a change from the old Sunday-to-Thursday week that happened in April 2026. Orders are accepted from 10:30 in the pre-open session, within 5% of the previous close, and since August 2026 the TMS also takes after-market orders from 5pm to 10am that queue for the next session. If you can't watch the market during the day, that's your buying tool: place the order in the evening and it sits ready for the open. Check today's NEPSE index before you set your reference price.
Two more rules from the same April 2026 change, because they will show up in your trading: individual stocks move at most 15% in a day, the market halts for 15 minutes if the index moves 5% within the first two hours of the session, and it closes for the day if the index reaches 8%.
When your shares arrive: T+2 and the costs
Buy on Monday, and your shares credit to your demat on Wednesday — two trading days later. Settlement counts trading days, not calendar days, so a weekend or a festival pushes everything out. The clearance runs through CDS and Clearing Ltd (CDSC), which nets each broker's position and settles funds and shares centrally on the second day. The cash from a sale lands on the same T+2, and moving it to your bank normally takes another day — don't plan a same-day withdrawal. The full mechanics, including what happens when a trade looks like it's vanished into the two-day gap, are in our T+2 settlement guide.
Three charges come off every trade, deducted at settlement rather than billed separately: broker commission, a 0.015% SEBON fee, and a flat Rs 25 DP charge per company per settlement. On a Rs 1,00,000 buy, that's about Rs 370 in total — roughly 0.37%. Selling adds the same three again, plus capital gains tax on any gain. The full breakdown is in our share-trading-cost guide.
| Trade value | Broker commission |
|---|---|
| Up to Rs 50,000 | 0.36% |
| Rs 50,001 to Rs 5,00,000 | 0.33% |
| Rs 5,00,001 to Rs 20,00,000 | 0.31% |
| Rs 20,00,001 to Rs 1,00,00,000 | 0.27% |
| Above Rs 1,00,00,000 | 0.24% |
SEBON sets these as ceiling rates; they've been in force since May 2024, and most brokers charge them exactly. A few rate cards quote slightly different mid-tier figures; the difference is a few rupees.
Selling, and the tax that comes with it
Selling needs one thing done in advance: your shares must be authorized to leave your demat through e-DIS in MeroShare, which is what your transaction PIN is for. If that's not set up, the sale can't settle.
Capital gains tax is withheld at settlement, before the proceeds reach you. As of October 2026, an individual pays 3.75% on the gain when the shares were held more than 365 days, and 5% when held a year or less; institutions pay 10%. Only the gain is taxed — sale proceeds minus your weighted average cost, where every buy updates the average and bonus shares enter at zero. The promised loss set-off isn't in force yet, so each profitable sale is taxed on its own. And because the rate has already moved twice this fiscal year, check the date on any number you read. The weighted-average math and the filing thresholds are in our capital gains guide.
The IPO-only path: no broker needed
If you're here for IPOs, the path is shorter: demat, CRN and MeroShare, and you're set — no broker until you want to sell. The minimum application is 10 kitta; at Rs 100 par per share, that's Rs 1,000, blocked in your bank until allotment. Oversubscribed issues go to a lottery, with a maximum 10 kitta in the first round. Allotted shares credit to your demat within a couple of weeks, before the stock lists, but selling on listing day needs a TMS — so open the broker account before then. Our IPO application guide covers the process step by step.
Common mistakes that cost beginners money
- Name or signature mismatches: rejected applications and uncredited shares.
- Skipping the CRN: IPO applications fail silently.
- Keeping the default MeroShare password, or never setting the transaction PIN: you can't authorize a sale when you need to.
- Letting the demat or MeroShare renewal lapse: around Rs 150 a year total, and everything freezes.
- Logging into a fake MeroShare clone: keep the official address bookmarked.
- Buying on hype: pull up a heavily traded name like NABIL and check its price history against the whole market before you hit buy — the live NEPSE index page is where I'd start.
Once your accounts are live, the skill that matters is reading the market, not opening accounts. Nepsense's charts, screeners and floorsheet tools run on official NEPSE data and are built for the way this market actually trades — see the plans when you're ready.
Key takeaways
- You need three things to trade NEPSE: a demat (BOID), MeroShare, and a broker's TMS. IPOs need only the first two plus a linked bank.
- First-year costs are small: about Rs 250–300 for demat plus MeroShare, free broker opening, and roughly 0.37% per side on a Rs 1 lakh trade, plus a flat Rs 25 DP charge.
- Shares arrive on T+2, counted in trading days. No same-day selling on NEPSE.
- Capital gains tax is withheld at settlement: 3.75% for holdings over 365 days, 5% for a year or less, for individuals, as of October 2026.
- Keep your name consistent, renew the accounts annually, set the transaction PIN, use limit orders, and bookmark the official MeroShare address.