India, Aug. 20 -- The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) is likely to introduce an intraday limit in index options trading for clients to ensure that no single participant takes excessive positions in the hugely popular index options segment during trading hours. The proposal is being discussed by a regulatory committee, the Secondary Market Advisory Committee (SMAC), on Tuesday. The panel comprises officials from exchanges, depositories and brokerages. The meeting comes close on the heels of the regulator cracking down on US high frequency trader Jane Street for its alleged manipulation of non-benchmark and benchmark indices such as Nifty and Bank Nifty to make outsized gains in options trades. Jane Street has been ordered to disgorge nearly Rs.4,850 crore in alleged illegal gains and has been banned from the Indian securities market until further notice. The firm has disputed Sebi's findings and stated it will engage further with the regulator. Currently, no participant in index options can exceed a net limit of Rs.15 billion by the end of the day and a gross limit of Rs.100 billion on any day. However, these limits have been significantly enhanced under Sebi's 29 May circular. The new framework, which became effective 1 July, sets the net end-of-day position limit for index options at Rs.1,500 crore and gross position limits at Rs.10,000 crore each for long and short positions. Many clients take a higher position intraday and ensure their net positions adhere to the Rs.15 billion end-of-day limit. The issue, according to two persons aware of the SMAC meeting, is that on a weekly expiry day--Tuesday for Sensex and Thursday for Nifty--clients take higher limits and then since the contract expires, there is no end-of-day limit needed to adhere to. "To ensure that the EOD limit is adhered to on expiry days as well, we expect Sebi to introduce an intraday net limit and to direct exchanges to ensure that the EOD limits are respected on the expiry days as well," said one of the persons cited above. Sebi's 29 May circular introduced a comprehensive overhaul of the equity derivatives framework, implementing a Future Equivalent Open Interest (FutEq OI) methodology. This delta-based approach replaces the traditional notional open interest calculation, providing a more accurate assessment of actual risk exposure by considering the price sensitivity of each contract....