Washington, DC – The Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board (MSRB) has received approval from the Securities and Exchange Commission to apply its customer complaint rules to municipal advisors while also modernizing the rules, which currently apply to municipal securities dealers. The updated rules, which take effect in nine months, will more clearly focus on customer and municipal advisory client education and protection.
“These positive changes will improve the ability of investors and state and local governments to understand what to do if they have a complaint about their municipal finance professional,” said MSRB Executive Director Lynnette Kelly. “They also align the MSRB’s customer complaint requirements more closely with those of other regulators and provide greater regulatory consistency for dealers and municipal advisors.”
The MSRB’s updated MSRB Rule G-10 and related interpretive guidance require dealers and municipal advisors to provide annual written notifications to customers and municipal advisory clients about their registration status, the MSRB’s website address, the availability of a brochure that describes regulatory protections in place under MSRB rules and how to report a complaint to a regulator. Those notifications may be made electronically and may be included with other materials. The updates include changes to MSRB recordkeeping rules, and both dealers and municipal advisors will be required to retain an electronic complaint log of written complaints from customers or municipal advisory clients for six years.
Updates to the MSRB’s customer complaint and related recordkeeping rules are part of its ongoing effort to promote regulatory efficiency, consistency and clarity in municipal securities regulation. With many MSRB rules in place for more than 35 years, the MSRB recognizes the need to regularly review rules to identify potential changes to ensure that they function as efficiently as possible, reflect current market practices and are consistent with rules of other regulators, where appropriate.
Date: January 18, 2017
Contact: Jennifer A. Galloway, Chief Communications Officer
202-838-1500
[email protected]