FINRA Releases Enhanced Version of BrokerCheck

WASHINGTON — The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) announced today that it has released an enhanced version of BrokerCheck that allows investors to more quickly access and more intuitively understand the professional background of investment professionals.

"Investors using BrokerCheck will encounter a more user-friendly interface that allows them to quickly find information that can help them decide if an investment professional is right for them," said Derek Linden, FINRA Executive Vice President, Registration and Disclosure.

Now investors can search both the BrokerCheck and Investment Adviser Public Disclosure (IAPD) record of any securities professional or firm directly on the FINRA homepage. The BrokerCheck search results are presented in a graphical timeline, illustrating a more user-friendly view of the industry professional's employment status and history, industry registrations, and any reportable events such as customer disputes or disciplinary actions that may have occurred during his or her career.

FINRA will also make the new BrokerCheck widget available to third party websites, allowing visitors to those websites direct access to securities professionals' or firms' BrokerCheck or IAPD reports without having to visit the FINRA or SEC websites. Investors can obtain more information about, and the disciplinary record of, any FINRA-registered broker or brokerage firm by using FINRA's BrokerCheck. FINRA makes BrokerCheck available at no charge. In 2012, members of the public used this service to conduct 14.6 million reviews of broker or firm records. Investors can access BrokerCheck at www.finra.org/brokercheck or by calling (800) 289-9999.

FINRA, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, is the largest independent regulator for all securities firms doing business in the United States. FINRA is dedicated to investor protection and market integrity through effective and efficient regulation and complementary compliance and technology-based services. FINRA touches virtually every aspect of the securities business – from registering and educating all industry participants to examining securities firms, writing rules, enforcing those rules and the federal securities laws, informing and educating the investing public, providing trade reporting and other industry utilities, and administering the largest dispute resolution forum for investors and firms. For more information, please visit www.finra.org.