How to Buy & Sell Shares in Nepal 2026: Fees, Tax, Capital Gain & WACC Explained

Part 4 of 5 in the Nepal Share Market Academy: Zero to Expert series. You'll want Part 2 (accounts) done before this one.

Ram Sells a Share and Gets Less Than He Expected

Here's a story you'll probably recognise. Ram bought 100 shares at Rs. 500. A few weeks later the price hit Rs. 600, and he sold. In his head he'd made Rs. 10,000. Simple.

Then the money landed in his account, and it was noticeably less. He checked three times, thinking the broker had made a mistake. Nobody had. Brokerage, a SEBON fee, a DP charge and capital gain tax had all taken a small bite, and Ram simply hadn't known they existed.

That's what this post is for. We'll walk through how to actually place a buy and a sell order, what every rupee of cost is, how tax works, and what that mysterious number called WACC means on your portfolio screen. Take your time with the examples. Once you've seen the math once, it stops being scary.

Before You Place Your First Order

Quick check, because this trips up a lot of beginners. You need three things ready:

A working TMS account with your broker (the trading platform from Part 2).
Money in your collateral, which is the balance you've deposited with your broker. That's your buying limit.
A Demat account linked with your broker, since that's where bought shares end up.

If one of these is missing, your order either won't go through or the shares won't land where you expect.

How to Buy Shares on NEPSE, Step by Step

Every broker's TMS looks a little different, but the flow is basically the same everywhere.

Log in to your broker's TMS and check that your collateral shows the amount you expect.
Find the company using its short code, called the symbol or scrip. Every listed company has one, like a short nickname.
Look at the market depth. This screen shows the waiting buyers and sellers and the prices they've asked for. We'll come back to it in a moment, because it tells you a lot.
Choose Buy and enter the quantity (minimum 10) and the price you're willing to pay.
Check twice, then submit. Seriously. A typo like 5000 instead of 500 is the most expensive mistake a beginner makes.
Watch the order status. It'll show as pending, partly done or fully done.
Wait for settlement. Remember T+2 from Part 1. The shares reach your Demat account a couple of working days later.

Market Depth, in Plain Words

Market depth is simply a list of what buyers and sellers are asking for right now. On one side, the bid, you'll see the prices people want to buy at. On the other, the ask, the prices people want to sell at.

Say the best bid is Rs. 498 and the best ask is Rs. 500. If you want your order done right away, you'd have to offer Rs. 500. If you're patient, you could put in Rs. 498 and wait for a seller to come down to you. A thin depth with very few orders usually means the share is hard to trade, which is useful to know before you buy.

Order Types You'll Run Into

Limit order: You name the price. The order only happens at that price or better. This is the safest choice for beginners.
Market order: You say "give me whatever the best available price is." It's fast, but you don't control the price. Check whether your TMS offers it.

Orders usually stay active only for that day. If nobody matches yours by 3 PM, it expires, and you try again the next day.

How to Sell Shares

Selling works like buying in reverse. You log in, pick the company, choose Sell, enter the quantity and your price, and submit. A few things are worth knowing:

You can only sell shares that have actually reached your Demat account. If you bought them two days ago, check first.
Brokers have their own steps for moving your shares out of your Demat when a sale happens. Ask yours how it works the day you open the account, so it isn't a surprise later.
The money isn't instant. It settles after the T+2 cycle, then reaches your broker account, and from there you request a withdrawal to your bank.

Also remember the circuit limit. If a share is hitting its lower circuit (down 10 percent for the day), there may be very few buyers. You might want out and simply can't get out at that moment. It happens, and it's one more reason not to put everything into one stock.

Every Cost You'll Pay, Explained

Alright, the part Ram missed. When you buy and sell in Nepal, these are the usual charges. Rates change now and then, so use the numbers below as a guide and confirm the latest from your broker or SEBON.

1. Broker Commission

Your broker charges a percentage of the transaction amount. It follows slabs set by the regulator: the bigger your trade, the lower the percentage. As a rough picture, the range has been from about 0.40 percent for small trades down to about 0.27 percent for very large ones. You pay it on both buying and selling.

2. SEBON Fee

A small regulatory fee, roughly 0.015 percent of the transaction amount, on both sides.

3. DP Charge

A small flat fee, around Rs. 25 per scrip for each sale transaction, taken for moving shares out of your Demat account.

4. Capital Gain Tax (CGT)

This is tax on your profit, and only when you make one. We'll go deeper below.

5. Tax on Dividends and Bonus

Cash dividends and bonus shares carry their own tax, usually 5 percent, and it's normally deducted by the company before you receive anything. You won't pay it yourself in most cases, but it explains why a "10 percent dividend" arrives a bit smaller.

Capital Gain Tax, Without the Headache

Capital gain is just your profit from selling a share for more than you paid. Capital Gain Tax is the government's share of that profit.

For individual investors, the rate currently depends on how long you held the shares:

Held for up to 365 days: about 7.5 percent of the profit.
Held for more than 365 days: about 5 percent of the profit.
Companies and institutions: a higher flat rate, around 10 percent.

Two points that matter. First, tax is charged on the profit, not on the whole sale amount. Second, your broker normally deducts it for you at the time of sale and sends it to the tax office, so it comes out before the money reaches you. The rules get tweaked in the government's annual budget, so double-check the current rates every year.

Notice what the two rates are quietly telling you: the system rewards patience. Holding good shares for more than a year lowers the tax on your gain.

WACC: The Number That Decides Your Profit

Open your portfolio on Meroshare and you'll see a column called WACC. In Nepal's share market this means your weighted average cost. It's the average price per share that you paid for a holding, taking every purchase into account.

Why does it exist? Because most people don't buy a company's shares only once. You buy some now, more later at a different price, maybe get bonus shares too. WACC blends all of that into a single average, and your profit and your tax are measured against it.

A Simple WACC Example

Ram buys the same company twice:

100 shares at Rs. 400, total Rs. 40,000
100 shares at Rs. 300, total Rs. 30,000

Total spent is Rs. 70,000 for 200 shares. Divide, and his average cost is Rs. 350 per share. That's his WACC.

If he later sells at Rs. 420, his profit is measured from Rs. 350, not from Rs. 400 or Rs. 300. That's what the tax office uses too.

Bonus shares change the picture. Since you didn't pay for them, they generally count as costing nothing in the average, which pulls your WACC down. Check how your own statement shows it, as systems can present it a little differently.

In plain words: your WACC is your break-even line. Sell above it and you're in profit before costs. Sell below it and you've taken a loss. Knowing it keeps you from selling on emotion.

A Full Example With Real Numbers

Let's finally solve Ram's mystery. The rates below are the typical ones from this post, used for illustration only, so your exact figures may differ a little.

Ram buys 100 shares at Rs. 500 and later sells at Rs. 600, within a year.

Item	Calculation	Amount (Rs.)
Buy value	100 × 500	50,000
Broker commission on buy	0.40% of 50,000	200
SEBON fee on buy	0.015% of 50,000	7.50
Sell value	100 × 600	60,000
Broker commission on sell	0.37% of 60,000	222
SEBON fee on sell	0.015% of 60,000	9
DP charge	Flat	25
Total costs		463.50
Profit before tax	10,000 − 463.50	9,536.50
Capital gain tax	7.5% of 9,536.50	715
Money Ram actually keeps		about 8,821

So the profit he imagined was Rs. 10,000, and the profit he actually kept was around Rs. 8,800. Roughly a ninth of it went to costs and tax. Not a disaster, but not nothing either.

Here's a useful rule of thumb that falls out of this math: after fees on both sides, a share needs to rise by roughly 1 percent just for you to break even. Anyone who buys and sells the same share many times in a week is paying that toll again and again. That's one quiet reason why constant trading wears down so many beginners.

Book Closure: How People Miss Dividends

This one catches almost everyone once. When a company announces a dividend or bonus, it sets a book closure date. Only the shareholders recorded on that date receive the benefit.

Because settlement takes T+2, you can't buy the day before book closure and expect to be included. The shares won't have reached you yet. The announcement notice normally states the last date to buy in order to qualify, so read that date, not just the book closure date.

And don't assume the price just keeps climbing for you afterwards. After book closure, the share price often adjusts downward by roughly the value of the benefit paid. Buying purely "to catch the dividend" and expecting a free lunch rarely works out the way people think.

Mistakes That Cost Real Money

Typing errors. Wrong quantity or an extra zero in the price. Slow down at the submit button.
Ignoring costs. You don't keep the gross profit. Always work out the net figure first.
Selling in panic. Prices fall, you freak out, you sell at the bottom. Compare against your WACC and your original reason for buying before you act.
Trading too often. Every round trip costs you roughly 1 percent. Do that twenty times and the damage is serious.
Borrowing to invest. Brokers may offer margin facilities. Beginners who borrow often find that the interest and the pressure are heavier than any profit.
Trusting tips. If a stranger knew a share would double, they wouldn't be telling you.
Missing the last buy date before book closure.
Putting everything in one company or one sector.

A Few Habits That Make Life Easier

Write down, even in a notes app, why you bought each share. When you feel like selling, read it first.
Keep a simple record of your purchases, sales and fees. It helps with tax questions later.
Decide a sensible amount for any single stock before you buy, not after.
Check your WACC regularly so your decisions are based on real numbers, not on memory.
Keep an emergency fund separate from your trading money.

Terms Explained: Quick Glossary

Term	Simple Meaning	Why It Matters
Symbol / Scrip	Short code of a listed company	How you find a company in TMS
Market depth	List of waiting buy and sell orders	Shows demand and how easy trading is
Bid	Price a buyer is offering	Where buyers are willing to trade
Ask	Price a seller wants	Where sellers are willing to trade
Limit order	Order with a price you set	Protects you from bad prices
Market order	Order at the best available price	Fast, but price isn't controlled
Brokerage commission	Fee your broker charges per trade	Reduces your profit on every trade
SEBON fee	Small regulatory charge on each trade	Part of your total cost
DP charge	Fee for moving shares from your Demat	Applies when you sell
Capital gain	Profit from selling above your cost	The basis of your tax
CGT	Capital Gain Tax on profit	Deducted before you get your money
WACC	Average cost per share you paid	Your break-even and tax reference
Book closure	Date that fixes who gets a dividend or bonus	Miss the last buy date and you miss the benefit
Margin lending	Borrowing from a broker to buy shares	Increases both profit and risk
T+2	Settlement two working days after trade	Affects when shares and cash arrive
Lower circuit	Maximum daily fall allowed	You may not be able to sell at that moment

Frequently Asked Questions

Is there a minimum amount to buy shares?
The minimum quantity is generally 10 shares. So the money needed depends on the price of the share.

Do I pay tax even if I make a loss?
Capital gain tax is charged on profit. If you sold at a loss, there's no profit to tax. Ask a tax professional about how losses are treated in your situation.

Does the broker deduct the capital gain tax automatically?
Usually yes, at the time of sale. You'll see the deduction in your settlement statement.

What does WACC mean on Meroshare?
It's your average buying cost per share for a company, combining all your purchases. Your profit is measured against it.

Can I cancel an order?
Yes, if it hasn't been fully matched. Use the cancel or modify option in your TMS while the market is open.

Can I trade after 3 PM?
No. NEPSE trading follows fixed hours, covered in Part 1. Orders left unmatched at the close expire.

Is it better to hold for more than a year?
Tax is lower on holdings beyond 365 days, but that shouldn't be your only reason. Hold a share because the company is worth holding, and enjoy the lower tax as a bonus.

Are the fees the same at every broker?
Commission follows regulated slabs, so they're close. Service quality, platform reliability and support are where brokers really differ.

What's Next?

You now know how a trade really works, from the click to the cash in your bank, and you can calculate your real profit. In Part 5: Nepal Stock Analysis: Fundamental, Technical & Portfolio Strategy, the final part, we get to the expert stuff: how to judge whether a share is worth buying, how to read charts, and how to build a portfolio that can survive bad months.

Disclaimer: This article is for education only and is not financial advice. Fee slabs, tax rates and procedures are revised from time to time, and the numbers here are for illustration, so confirm current rules with SEBON, NEPSE, the Inland Revenue Department or your broker before acting.

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