Jack no probs - I hear you.
Tanvin - being UK based I would use standard brokers to buy uk listed investment trusts like Templeton Emerging Markets or possibly JP Morgan India
. There are some other listed investment type vehicles which invest in specifics like Commercial Property or Hospitality Sector and I'm currently evaluating them for my pension.
As for trading - the Indian market is very tricky probably more so than the US markets. The dow has range this year of 1000pts give or take but in the indian mini bear market the market eventually fell over 3800 pts pretty quickly - in fact you probably remember the one day of the crash when it was down over 10%! That's pretty hairy.
I'm still interested because I want that kind of volatility - but I want to wait until the market is stretched enough to make a big move more likely. Pity I don't stick to that method more often but that's another story...
It should be "relatively" easy to play this market if the trader is patient and waits for the openings. Just before the May slide it was pretty obvious that something had to give - the market was accelerating up 500pts one week then up 700 the next etc So when I say tricky shorts were getting crushed despite having commonsense on their side. I remember that movie from 1999/2000 so I waited ....... I was like a little child in early part of May as it left 12k behind and HAD to break 13k next or the bubble would burst. We know what happened - shame I did not have a bigger short position but maybe I'm being GREEDY.
On to your question - sorry - I can only trade Nifty futures at present with IG index or Finspreads.com I say only because I would much prefer the larger Sensex (12k vs ~3500 for Nifty). The thing I don't like though is they have monthly expires and I would prefer the quarterlies. Good News maybe around the corner since I hear US will soon be listing Sensex futures similar to the ones traded in Bombay. Hopefully then the spread guys will trade it too.
So - sexy but dangerous. I'll stick to very overbought or oversold situations to make my money trading India. With markets hovering below 12k on Sensex it's getting close to a trade - as you probably know the High was around 12670. I'm long term bullish but not at these levels!
Hook Shot