On February 12, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) issued Regulatory Notice 21-04 (Notice), in connection with an amendment to FINRA’s Codes of Arbitration Procedure for Customer and Industry Disputes, regarding certain fees paid to arbitration chairpersons. FINRA Rules 12214 and 13214 were amended to increase the hearing-day chairperson fee from $125 to $250 to better compensate the chairperson for the additional training and responsibilities required of the position. Additionally, the amendments establish a new chairperson fee for an additional $125 for each prehearing conference that the chairperson leads, even if an arbitration case closes without a hearing.
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New Rate for Fees Paid Under Section 31 of the Exchange Act
On February 16, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) issued an Information Notice (Notice) regarding a new fee rate applicable to specified securities transactions on the exchanges and in the over-the-counter markets. Such fee rate will decrease from its current rate of $22.10 per million dollars in transactions to a new rate of $5.10 per million dollars in transactions.
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FINRA Releases Notice on Expungement of Customer Dispute Information
On July 20, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) issued Regulatory Notice 20-25, amending its Codes of Arbitration Procedure for Customer and Industry Disputes. These amendments will apply certain minimum fees where associated persons (or those acting on their behalf) request that customer dispute information be expunged from Central Registration Depository (CRD). These minimum fees…
SEC Chairman Speaks on Modernizing US Equity Market Structure
On June 22, Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Jay Clayton and Brett Redfearn, the Director of the SEC’s Division of Trading and Markets, spoke together on an SEC-sponsored virtual forum about modernizing the US Equity Market Structure. Chairman Clayton identified the market for thinly traded securities, retail fraud and National Market System (NMS) market data and access as three current targets for SEC initiatives.
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New Rate for Fees Paid Under Section 31 of the Exchange Act
On February 3, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) issued an Information Notice regarding fees paid under Section 31 of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (the Exchange Act).
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SEC Proposes Modernization of Filing Fee Disclosure and Payment Methods
On October 24, the Securities and Exchange Commission proposed amendments to update filing fee disclosure and payment methods. The proposed amendments would apply to most fee-bearing forms, schedules and statements, including Forms S-1, S-3, S-4, S-8 and S-11, related foreign private issuer forms, proxy statements, information statements, Schedule TO and certain Investment Company Act of 1940 forms.
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SEC Increases Registration Statement Filing Fees for Fiscal Year 2020
On August 23, the Securities and Exchange Commission announced that, effective October 1, the fees that public companies and other issuers pay to register their securities with the SEC will increase from $121.20 per million dollars to $129.80 per million dollars, an increase of approximately 7.1 percent. This increase in the SEC registration statement filing…
FINRA Publishes Regulatory Notice Regarding 2018 GASB Accounting Support Fee
On April 17, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority issued Regulatory Notice 18-12, which announces that FINRA will collect a total of $8,346,300 to fund the annual budget of the Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB) by collecting $2,086,575 from member firms each calendar quarter beginning in April 2018.
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SEC Proposes Transaction Fee Pilot Program
On March 14, the Securities and Exchange Commission proposed new Rule 610T of Regulation National Market System (Reg NMS), which would create a Transaction Fee Pilot program for all NMS stocks. The pilot program is designed to produce data on the effect of transaction fees and rebates on order routing behavior, execution quality, and market quality of the equities exchanges, including taker-maker exchanges.
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Who Pays for MiFID II implementation in UK?
On November 16, the UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) published a consultation (Consultation) on regulatory fees and levies, and its policy proposals for 2017/2018. The Consultation sets forth the FCA’s proposals on: 1) the structure of a new levy to fund action against illegal money lending; 2) the relevant groups (fee-blocks) of regulated firms from which the FCA intends to recover the costs of implementing the revised Market in Financial Instrument Directive (MiFID II); 3) proposals for market infrastructure providers to use income as a measure to calculate fees to recover the FCA’s annual funding requirement; and 4) amendments and clarifications to be made to the FCA’s Fee Manual, among others.
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