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The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (‘FINRA’) launched today its new Disciplinary Actions Online database, which provides access to Finra complaints against firms and individual brokers, settlement agreements (known as Letters of Acceptance Waivers and Consent, or AWCs), decisions by Finra hearing panels and National Adjudicatory Council decisions.
Previously, the public had to contact FINRA to obtain copies of these documents, or obtain them by Subpoena and also pay up to $25 per document.
FINRA publishes a monthly summary of completed cases, which takes years to complete, and often long after the statute of limitations have expired for claims by injured investors, but has never provided any documents in these summaries.
Decisions by regional hearing panels and by the National Adjudicatory Committe, have always searchable on FINRA’s website, but since actual decisions are rare because in most cases firms either consent to sanctions by Letters of Acceptance Waivers and Consent, or in the case of defunct firms or brokers who leave the industry, they default and never respond to these actions, actual decisions are rare.
The database also includes pending complaints FINRAa has filed against firms and brokers. This feature could make pending complaints easier to find, compared to the multi-step process needed to find pending actions disclosed on FINRA’s BrokerCheck system, which are taken from editorialized disclosures made by typically lawyers, where substantially no useful information is disclosed.
BrokerCheck reports will now provide links to the disciplinary documents in the new database, FINRA said, as it does now for arbitration awards beginning June 15, 2011.
Nicholas J. Guiliano, Esquire, Guiliano Law Firm, P.C. Practice limited to the representation of investors in arbitration claims against stockbrokers for fraud, the sale of unsuitable investments, breach of fiduciary duty, failure to supervise. National Practice. Contingent Fee. Free Consultation. (877) SEC-ATTY
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