When investors receive their contract notes or check their ledger statements after trading, two charges consistently appear — brokerage and DP charges. Many investors, especially beginners, assume these are the same fee charged differently, or that one is just a component of the other. They are entirely separate charges, collected by different entities, for entirely different services.
What Is Brokerage?
Brokerage is the fee you pay your stock broker for executing trades on your behalf — for placing buy or sell orders on the stock exchange. It is the broker’s primary revenue source and the fee in return for which the broker provides their trading platform, research tools, customer support, and order execution infrastructure. Every time you execute a trade — equity delivery, intraday, futures, options, or currency — brokerage is charged.
Discount brokers like Zerodha, Upstox, and Groww have democratised this fee significantly. Zerodha charges zero brokerage on equity delivery trades (long-term investing), and a flat ₹20 or 0.03% per order (whichever is lower) on intraday, F&O, and currency trades. Full-service brokers like ICICI Direct, HDFC Securities, and Kotak Securities charge a percentage of trade value (typically 0.3% to 0.5% per transaction) rather than a flat fee.
What Are DP Charges?
DP charges are fees levied by your Depository Participant (DP) when securities are debited from your demat account — specifically when you sell shares. They are not charged by the broker as a service fee for trading; they are charged by the depository infrastructure (CDSL or NSDL) and your broker as its registered DP for the physical record-keeping work of updating the electronic ownership records.
At Zerodha, the DP charge is ₹15.34 per scrip per day for selling equity shares — comprising ₹3.50 (CDSL’s fee), ₹9.50 (Zerodha’s DP charge), and ₹2.34 (18% GST). Female account holders (as first holder) get a ₹0.25 discount on the CDSL component.
The Key Differences at a Glance
| Parameter | Brokerage | DP Charges |
| Charged By | Stock broker | Depository (CDSL/NSDL) + Broker (as DP) |
| When Applied | On every executed trade (buy and sell) | Only when selling/debiting securities from demat |
| Basis of Charge | % of trade value or flat per order | Per scrip per day (fixed) |
| Applies to Buying? | Yes | No |
| Applies to F&O? | Yes | No (F&O positions don’t involve demat) |
| Applies to Intraday? | Yes | No (shares not credited to demat in intraday) |
| Zerodha Rate | ₹0 delivery; ₹20 flat intraday/F&O | ₹15.34 per scrip per day (equity delivery sell) |
| Varies with Trade Size? | Yes (if %) or No (if flat) | No — fixed per scrip regardless of quantity |
| Can Be Negotiated? | Yes (with full-service brokers) | No — CDSL/NSDL component is fixed |
Practical Illustration
Suppose you buy 100 shares of Reliance and 200 shares of TCS as delivery trades on Zerodha. No DP charge on buying. No brokerage on equity delivery buying at Zerodha. When you sell both positions on different days, you pay ₹15.34 × 2 = ₹30.68 in DP charges — one charge per scrip per day of debit. No brokerage is charged on the sell side either since delivery is free on Zerodha.
If you had traded intraday instead, brokerage would be ₹20 per executed order (both buy and sell) but DP charges would not apply since intraday positions are closed on the same day without demat account movement.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Q1. What is the basic difference between DP charges and brokerage?
Brokerage is paid to the broker for executing trades. DP charges are paid to the depository (CDSL/NSDL) via your broker when you sell shares from your demat account.
Q2. Are DP charges applied on buying shares?
No — DP charges apply only on selling (debiting securities from demat). Buying (crediting securities to demat) does not attract DP charges.
Q3. Do DP charges apply to intraday trades?
No — intraday positions are squared off on the same day without any movement of securities in the demat account.
Q4. Can DP charges be avoided?
The CDSL/NSDL component of DP charges cannot be avoided. The broker’s DP fee component varies — choosing a low-cost discount broker minimises the total DP charge.
Q5. Is brokerage charged even if no trade is executed?
No — brokerage is only charged when orders are actually executed. Cancelled or rejected orders do not attract brokerage charges.
