Guidance

Requirements under NASD Rule 3030 (formerly Article III, Section 43) for investment seminar activities conducted by dually registered persons that charge fees from participants.

Clarification of NASD Notice to Members 94-44 to situations in which a dually registered person maintains discretionary trading authority, determines portfolio changes, and prepares trade instructions for customer accounts and charges the accounts an asset-based fee.

Whether a proposed standby purchase agreement entered into between affiliate of a member and an issuer in connection with a public offering of the issuer's common stock could constitute an option.

Cash rebates issued to pension plan customers with respect to secondary market transactions in outstanding securities (under former Article III, Section 24, now Rule 2740 and IM-2740).

The MSRB Markup/Markdown Analysis Report is a monthly report designed to assist firms in their supervision activities by providing transparency into a portion of FINRA's surveillance of fixed income transactions' customer pricing.  

The MSRB Markup/Markdown Analysis Report is built upon logic developed to pair purchase and sale transactions reported to EMMA.  

• Observations on Cybersecurity
• Business Continuity Plans
• Fixed Income Mark-up Disclosure

The Municipal Continuing Disclosure Report displays statistics about transactions that your firm effected with customers. The report provides relevant information about the availability of official statements, annual financial filings, and event filings on the MSRB's Electronic Municipal Market Access system (EMMA) at the time the securities were sold or purchased. Specifically, the report shows counts of transactions with customers for which official statements and/or current annual financial filings were not available on EMMA at the time the transaction occurred.

FINRA evaluates 11 broad risk categories as a foundation to monitor and assess member firm¹ risk and inform our risk-based examination program. We are sharing this risk framework and risk assessment methodology as part of our FINRA Forward Initiative to provide greater transparency into our risk assessment processes to further empower member firm compliance.

Background

Examinations are central to FINRA's regulatory operations, and they are one of the principal means by which the organization protects investors and promotes market integrity. FINRA's examinations also aim to provide valuable feedback to firms on areas for improvement and best practices based on insights we have gathered from examining others in the industry.