NISM Series XXV-B study plan

Map the structure of the Indian securities market into primary vs secondary, cash vs derivatives, and equity vs debt vs hybrid, naming the participants in each

List the financial-sector regulators (SEBI, RBI, IRDAI, PFRDA and the MCA/ROC route) and state in one line what each governs

Trace which statute or regulation authorises each activity: SEBI Act, SCRA, Depositories Act, Companies Act and the SEBI (Intermediaries) Regulations

Classify market intermediaries by the registration each needs before soliciting or handling client money

Explain the roles and obligations of stock exchanges, depositories, clearing corporations and registrar-and-transfer agents

Outline the investment adviser registration route: eligibility, qualification and certification requirements, capital adequacy, and ongoing compliance reporting

Contrast the investment adviser with a distributor, a portfolio manager and a broker across licensing, remuneration and liability

Distinguish fee-based from commission-based remuneration and identify which arrangements an adviser may and may not accept

State the fiduciary duty, the suitability obligation and the know-your-client obligation in operative terms

Explain how risk-profiling output translates into an asset-allocation recommendation

Apply the suitability standard to written client scenarios by matching risk profile, horizon and goal to a recommendation

Separate permitted non-core services from activities that require a separate registration

Describe what a person may and may not do when acting as a distributor while also giving advice, including disclosure of dual capacity

Identify the conflicts that arise in dual-capacity, referral and trail-commission arrangements and state the required mitigation for each

Draft a compliant disclosure a client would actually understand

Sequence the onboarding workflow end to end from first contact to signed agreement and first transaction

Identify the documents required for an individual and for a non-individual client, including the mandatory agreement contents

Explain the role of the uniform/client master and how it interacts with in-principle approval and exchange KYC records

Apply anti-money-laundering and PMLA obligations to client identification, beneficial ownership and suspicious-transaction escalation

State record-retention and data-confidentiality requirements for client files

Build a reusable onboarding checklist for an individual client and one for a corporate client

Explain e-KYC, digital-signature and in-person-verification routes and where each is acceptable

Describe periodic KYC updating, reclassification triggers and the consequences of a lapsed record

Draft the contents of an adviser-client agreement covering scope, fees, termination and grievance escalation

Distinguish permissible and impermissible forms of client communication and marketing during onboarding

Enumerate the code of conduct and ethical standards an adviser must meet, translating each into a concrete behavioural rule

Rank the common conflicts of interest by severity and specify the disclosure or avoidance response for each

Map the grievance-redressal ladder from internal complaint to SEBI SCORES and the online dispute-resolution route, including timelines

Explain advertising and solicitation restrictions and the limits on performance claims and testimonials

State the obligations around record-keeping, confidentiality, insider trading and the misuse of client information

Describe the consequences of non-compliance: inspection, audit, penalties and cancellation of registration

Re-attempt every question previously logged as an error and re-derive the rule behind each miss

Run a full-length timed mock exam under exam conditions with no notes

Cluster residual errors by domain and identify the two weakest sub-topics

Re-read the source text only for those two weak sub-topics

Memorise the numeric limits, timelines and thresholds that recur across domains

Re-run a second full-length timed mock and compare the sectional scores with the week-7 attempt

Drill the two weakest sub-topics until the error count falls to zero across three consecutive passes

Recite the registration obligations, onboarding documents and grievance timelines from memory

Confirm the exam-day logistics and plan the timing strategy for the paper