Zerodha kite nudges order slicing enhanced surveillance measure promoter pledge inter creditor agreement freeze quantity

Kite order nudges explained

From WebNotes, a public knowledge base. Last updated 21 June 2026. Reading time ~14 min.

Key facts

What a nudge is	A non-blocking notification on the Kite order window that flags a risk or a market-structure condition before the order goes to the exchange. It informs; it does not block, except for a few hard restrictions
Order slicing nudge	Appears when the quantity exceeds the exchange freeze limit; Kite splits the order into up to 50 simultaneous slices and marks each with a blue layer icon
Disable order slicing nudge	Raise a support ticket; processed within 72 working hours. Slicing itself keeps working, only the notification stops
ESM nudge	Shown for micro and small companies (market cap below Rs 500 crore) under the Enhanced Surveillance Measure; Stage 1 is trade-for-trade with a 5 per cent band, Stage 2 drops to 2 per cent with periodic call auction
Promoter-pledge nudge	Triggers when promoter pledged holding exceeds 50 per cent, or when 20 per cent of total outstanding shares are pledged
Price-versus-LTP nudge	Warns that a limit price sits 2 per cent (equity, futures) or 5 per cent (options) the wrong side of the last traded price, where market protection can fill it away from your price

A Kite order nudge is a non-blocking notification that Zerodha ’s Kite trading platform surfaces on the order window when the order, or the instrument it targets, matches a risk pattern or a market-structure condition that the exchange or Zerodha wants the client to see before the order leaves for the exchange. The nudge informs; in almost every case it does not block. You read it, you acknowledge it, and the order proceeds. This guide covers the six order-placement nudges traders meet most: the order-slicing nudge on large F&O orders, the surveillance-measures-and-risks nudge, the promoter-pledged-shares nudge, the Enhanced Surveillance Measure (ESM) nudge, the price-above-or-below-LTP nudge, and the illiquid-contract alert on far or thin derivatives.

Each section below states what the nudge warns, the exact regulatory or market basis for it, and whether you can proceed or turn it off. The nudges sit inside the broader Kite nudges framework , Zerodha’s behavioural-intervention layer; this page is the operational reference for the specific order-entry messages, not the design rationale, which the framework page and the behavioural-design page cover.

Conflict-of-interest disclosure. This guide is published by the WebNotes Editorial Team for informational purposes and is written independently. WebNotes operates a Zerodha account-opening referral programme, disclosed on the pages that carry the referral link; this guide does not carry it and earns no referral commission from the procedure described here.

What a nudge is, and what it is not

A nudge appears at the moment of order entry, inside the order window, not at login and not buried in account-opening paperwork. That placement is deliberate. A disclosure read at the point of decision changes conduct at the margin; the same words in a terms-and-conditions document do not. The nudge framework draws this directly from Zerodha’s own product writing on Z-Connect .

Two distinctions matter before the specific nudges. First, a nudge is not a block. The instruments below mostly let you click through and place the order after acknowledging the warning. The genuine hard blocks are narrow: fresh buying is rejected for stocks in surveillance stages that require an additional surveillance deposit, which Zerodha does not collect, and same-day selling of a trade-to-trade stock is rejected because the stock settles compulsorily on T+1. Those are rejections, returned through the RMS and order-rejection paths, not nudges. Second, a nudge is informational, not advisory. It cites a statistic or names a market-structure fact; it does not tell you to abandon the trade. That line keeps the nudge clear of SEBI ’s investment-adviser regulations, which reserve personalised advice for a registered adviser.

Zerodha redesigned how these prompts render in 2025. A nudge that once popped as a separate overlay requiring an extra click now appears as an icon inside the order window, so the information is present without an interrupting step. The surveillance and pledge nudges still throw a confirmation on the buy action, where the exchange mandate requires an acknowledgement.

Order-slicing nudge on large F&O orders

When you enter a quantity that exceeds the exchange freeze limit, Kite shows a nudge stating that the order will be split into multiple orders to manage exchange freeze-quantity limits. The freeze limit is the largest single order the exchange will accept for a contract; it exists mainly to stop fat-finger errors, where a mistyped quantity could disrupt the market. The NSE publishes the cap per contract under Volume Freeze Quantity on its website, and it changes with each contract’s lot size and the regulator’s position limits.

Kite handles the limit for you. Instead of rejecting the order the way a raw exchange gateway would, it slices the quantity into multiple orders that each sit within the freeze limit and sends them to the exchange together, so there is no execution delay between slices. The platform splits an order into up to 50 slices. For a Nifty order, each slice holds 1,755 quantities, so the slicing absorbs orders up to 87,750 quantities in one instruction. A buy of 100 lots in a contract with a 50-lot freeze limit becomes two 50-lot orders fired simultaneously. Each sliced order shows a blue layer icon in the order book so you can see at a glance which entries belong to one parent instruction. Slicing works in the normal order window, the option chain, Quick Baskets , Trade from Charts, and Positions, on both Kite web and the Kite mobile app since the June 2025 update.

Two operational facts to carry. Brokerage applies to each executed sliced order separately; an order that slices into five executed orders is charged as five orders, not one, which matters at Zerodha’s flat per-order brokerage on the F&O segment. And the slicing distinction is separate from a freeze-quantity rejection , which is the older behaviour where the exchange bounced an over-limit order; slicing is the automatic remedy that replaced manual splitting.

Disabling the order-slicing nudge

The order-slicing notification is the one order nudge you can turn off. Raise a support ticket at support.zerodha.com asking to disable it; the request is processed within 72 working hours. Disabling the nudge does not touch the slicing itself: large orders still split to comply with the freeze limit, you simply stop seeing the notification each time. For a high-frequency F&O trader who routinely places size above the freeze limit, removing the prompt cuts a repeated acknowledgement out of the flow without changing how the order executes.

Surveillance-measures-and-risks nudge

When you place an order in a stock that carries an active surveillance flag, Kite shows a notification listing the measures on that instrument, because the exchanges mandate that brokers display every active surveillance action at order entry. This is the umbrella nudge; it names the measures and links the trader to the risk each one carries. The measures it surfaces are the Additional Surveillance Measure (ASM) , the Graded Surveillance Measure (GSM) , the Inter Creditor Agreement (ICA), the Enhanced Surveillance Measure (ESM), and the promoter-pledged-holding flag, among others.

The point of the nudge is the consequence, not the label. Surveillance status changes how the stock trades, and the trader needs to know that before committing capital. Four consequences recur across the frameworks:

Consequence	What it means for your order	Stages that trigger it
Trade-for-trade	No intraday netting; same-day sell of a buy is rejected, delivery only on T+1	LT-ASM Stage 4, GSM Stage 2 and above, ESM Stage 1 and 2, ICA Stage 1 and 2
Price band tightened	The stock trades within a 5 per cent or lower daily band, capping the move	LT-ASM Stage 4, all stages of GSM, ESM, and ICA
Additional surveillance deposit	A margin deposit of 50 to 100 per cent is required; Zerodha does not collect it, so fresh buying is blocked though existing positions can be exited	GSM Stage 2 at 50 per cent, GSM Stage 3 and 4 at 100 per cent, ICA Stage 1 and 2 at 100 per cent
Periodic call auction	The stock trades only in batched auction windows, not continuously	GSM Stage 3 and above, ICA Stage 2, ESM Stage 2

The deeper coverage of how each framework escalates lives in ASM and GSM frameworks explained , ASM stages 1 to 4 , GSM Stage 2 restrictions , and surveillance measures and trading risks . The nudge is the order-window pointer to all of that; it does not block the order on its own, but the consequence it names may.

The ICA flag

A subset of the surveillance nudge is the Inter Creditor Agreement notification. When a company’s lenders have signed an ICA, the exchange requires the broker to flag it on every order in that stock. An ICA is the agreement lenders sign under the RBI’s stressed-asset resolution framework to act together on a defaulting borrower’s debt; its presence signals the company is in a lender-led resolution, with the equity sitting junior to a restructuring that can wipe it out. After you click Buy on such a stock, a second nudge appears, and you click Proceed to continue. ICA stocks carry the trade-for-trade and 100 per cent additional-deposit consequences, so fresh buying through Zerodha is blocked even though the nudge itself only informs.

Promoter-pledged-shares nudge

Kite shows the promoter-pledge nudge when a large slice of a company’s shares is pledged: specifically when the promoter’s pledged holding exceeds 50 per cent, or when 20 per cent of total outstanding shares, counting both promoter and non-promoter holdings, are pledged. The exchange requires the disclosure at order entry because pledge concentration is a documented stress signal.

A pledged share is one a promoter has put up as collateral for a loan. When the pledged proportion is high, two risks rise. If the share price falls and the promoter cannot top up the collateral, the lender can invoke the pledge and sell the shares into the open market, which adds forced selling pressure exactly when the stock is already weak. And a heavy reliance on pledged borrowing can indicate a promoter under liquidity strain, which has preceded several Indian corporate failures where the equity collapsed once invocation began. The threshold disclosure traces to SEBI’s framework on disclosure of encumbrance and the reasons for it by promoters of listed companies, which sits within the takeover-code disclosure regime. After you click Buy on a stock that trips the threshold, a second nudge appears; click Proceed to complete the purchase. The nudge does not block the trade, and a pledged stake is not in itself a defect, but the concentration is a fact the trader should price.

Enhanced Surveillance Measure (ESM) nudge

The ESM nudge flags that the stock is on the Enhanced Surveillance Measure list, a framework SEBI and the exchanges introduced for micro and small companies, defined as those with market capitalisation below Rs 500 crore. The purpose is to curb price manipulation in the smallest, thinnest counters, where a little capital can move the price a long way, and to make sure an investor sees the surveillance status before buying.

ESM runs in two stages, and the stage sets how the stock trades:

ESM stage	Settlement	Price band	Trading mechanism
Stage 1	Trade-for-trade, no intraday netting	5 per cent, or the existing 2 per cent band if the stock already has one	Continuous trading
Stage 2	Trade-for-trade, no intraday netting	2 per cent	Periodic call auction on all trading days

The trade-for-trade settlement is the operative restriction. It means every buy must be taken to delivery and every sell must be from existing holdings; you cannot buy and sell the same ESM stock intraday, and an attempt to square off on the same day is rejected, not nudged. In Stage 2 the stock leaves continuous trading entirely and trades only in batched periodic call auction windows, so the order does not match the instant you place it. The ESM framework is mandated through NSE and BSE circulars; the nudge is the order-window surfacing of that status. ESM sits alongside the ASM and GSM frameworks rather than inside them: ASM and GSM grade established stocks on volatility and price-volume patterns, while ESM is scoped specifically to the sub-Rs 500-crore segment.

Price x per cent above or below LTP nudge

This nudge fires on a limit order whose price sits a long way from where the stock is actually trading, on the aggressive side. Kite warns that the order price is a stated percentage above or below the last traded price , because the exchange will treat a limit order that aggressive as a market order with price protection, and it can fill at a worse price than you typed.

The threshold is the exchange’s market-protection range: a limit price that deviates from the LTP by more than 2 per cent in equity and equity futures, or more than 5 per cent in options, in the wrong direction, that is, a buy limit set above the LTP or a sell limit set below it. Set a buy limit at Rs 965 when the stock is at Rs 950 and you are not capping your price at Rs 965; you are telling the exchange you will buy up to 2 per cent through the market, and the order can sweep the book and fill higher than your number. The nudge is the warning that your limit is not behaving as a protective cap. If the aggressive price is intentional, proceed; if you actually want to trigger only when the price reaches a level, the correct tool is a stop-loss order or a GTT , not a far-from-LTP limit. This nudge is the order-window cousin of the outright rejection traders hit when a limit sits far enough from the LTP to breach the exchange’s reasonability range, covered in why limit orders far from LTP are rejected .

Illiquid-contract alert (ICA) on far or thin F&O

Kite surfaces an illiquid-contract alert when you try to trade a far-month or otherwise thin derivative, where the bid and ask can sit far from the last traded or theoretical price and an entry can be hard to exit. This is distinct from the Inter Creditor Agreement that shares the ICA initials; here it is the illiquid-contract warning on the F&O book. The alert exists because thin option contracts are the instruments fraudsters use to move money between accounts through manipulated trades, and because a trader who buys into a contract with no real two-way market can be stuck unable to exit at a fair price.

Zerodha layers two controls on the thinnest contracts. It blocks trading outright in near-month and far-month stock option contracts where both the last traded price and the open interest are zero, and in far-month and long-dated index option contracts on the same zero-LTP, zero-open-interest condition, because those have no functioning market at all. For the contracts it classifies as risky but allows, it requires a time-based one-time password (TOTP) login before the order goes through; an order placed without TOTP in a risky scrip is rejected with a message to set up TOTP. The TOTP control came out of a wave of phishing fraud where attackers used illiquid contracts to create artificial losses in compromised accounts. Intraday trading in these stocks stays barred by the exchanges regardless of TOTP; the TOTP path is for taking delivery with eyes open, not for intraday speculation. Before placing a far-month or thin-contract order, check the open interest and the spread on the market depth view; an empty book is the alert made visible.

Which nudges you can turn off

Most order nudges cannot be disabled, by design. The surveillance, pledge, ESM, ICA, LTP, and illiquid-contract messages are exchange-mandated or fraud-control disclosures that have to render at order entry; there is no client toggle, and a support ticket will not remove them because the obligation sits on the broker. The order-slicing notification is the single exception you can disable, through the ticket route described above, and even then only the notification stops, not the slicing.

If the nudges in your flow feel constant, the cause is usually the instruments, not a setting: trading micro-cap surveilled stocks, thin far-month options, or size above the freeze limit will each trip a mandated prompt every time. The deliberate cousin of the nudge is the F&O kill switch , which you can enable to block your own F&O access for a chosen period; that is a self-imposed hard stop, not a nudge, and it is the tool for a trader who wants more friction rather than less. For the alert side of the platform, the price and event alerts you set yourself are separate from these mandated order nudges and are managed in Add and customise alerts on Kite .

External references

References

Zerodha support, What are surveillance measures and risks associated with them? (as of 21 June 2026).
Zerodha support, ESM, promoter-pledged-shares, ICA, and order-slicing nudge articles (as of 21 June 2026).
NSE and BSE circulars on the Enhanced Surveillance Measure framework for companies with market capitalisation below Rs 500 crore.
SEBI framework on disclosure of encumbrance of shares and reasons for encumbrance by promoters of listed companies, under the SEBI (Substantial Acquisition of Shares and Takeovers) Regulations.
Reserve Bank of India, Prudential Framework for Resolution of Stressed Assets, on the Inter Creditor Agreement signed by lenders.
Zerodha Z-Connect, Mandatory TOTP for illiquid risky contracts (as of 21 June 2026).

Frequently asked questions

Can I disable order nudges on Kite?

Most surveillance and risk nudges cannot be switched off, because the exchange mandates the disclosure at order entry. The one exception is the order-slicing notification, which you can disable through a support ticket processed within 72 working hours; slicing still works.

Does a nudge block my order?

No. A nudge is a non-blocking notification you acknowledge and proceed past. A few conditions are hard blocks, not nudges: fresh buying in stages that need an additional surveillance deposit, and same-day selling of a trade-for-trade stock, both of which are rejected outright.

Why does Kite say my order will be split into multiple orders?

Your quantity exceeds the exchange freeze limit, the largest single order the exchange accepts. Kite slices it into multiple orders within the limit and sends them together. Each sliced order carries brokerage separately and shows a blue layer icon in the order book.

What is the ESM nudge on Kite?

It flags that the stock is under the Enhanced Surveillance Measure, applied to companies with market cap below Rs 500 crore. The stock settles trade-for-trade, so intraday selling is barred, and the price band is 5 per cent in Stage 1 or 2 per cent in Stage 2.

Why does Kite warn that promoter shares are pledged?

The exchange requires the disclosure when promoter pledged holding crosses 50 per cent, or when 20 per cent of all outstanding shares are pledged. A high pledge means promoters have borrowed against their stake, which can force selling if the lender invokes the pledge.

Why does Kite say my order price is above or below the LTP?

Your limit price sits more than 2 per cent (equity and futures) or 5 per cent (options) on the aggressive side of the last traded price. The exchange treats it as a market order with protection, so it can fill at a worse price than you typed.

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WebNotes Editorial Team

The WebNotes Editorial Team covers Indian capital markets, payments infrastructure and retail investor procedures. Every article is fact-checked against primary sources, principally SEBI circulars and master directions, NPCI specifications and the official support documentation published by the intermediary in question. Drafts go through a second-pair-of-eyes review and a separate compliance read before publication, and revisions are tracked against the SEBI and NPCI rule changes referenced in the methodology section.

Last reviewed: 21 June 2026
Conflicts of interest: WebNotes is independent. No relationship with any broker, registrar or bank named in this article.