Investor Alerts and Bulletins

The Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) Office of Investor Education and Advocacy is issuing this Investor Bulletin for investors to provide them with the basics, including some of the potential risks, of short sales.

The SEC’s Office of Investor Education is issuing this investor bulletin to help educate investors about the basics, including some of the potential risks, of options trading. Options trading may occur in a variety of securities marketplaces and may involve a wide range of financial products, from stocks to foreign currencies. This bulletin focuses on the basics of trading listed stock options.

The SEC’s Office of Investor Education is issuing this investor bulletin to help you to understand what to expect when opening an options trading account with your broker-dealer.

Whether you’re a first-time investor or have been investing for years, here are fifteen tips to help you make more informed financial decisions and avoid common investment scams in 2015.

The SEC’s Office of Investor Education and Advocacy is issuing this bulletin to make investors aware of the miscellaneous fees charged by some brokers.

The SEC’s Office of Investor Education and Advocacy is issuing this Investor Bulletin to help educate investors about bank sweep programs, which some broker-dealers offer to their customers as a way to manage cash in their brokerage accounts. This Investor Bulletin describes some of the potential risks associated with bank sweep programs and suggests questions you may want to consider asking your broker-dealer to help you decide how to best manage the cash in your brokerage account.

The Securities and Exchange Commission's (SEC) Office of Investor Education and Advocacy is issuing this Investor Bulletin to provide investors with information on the SEC's Delinquent Filings Program.

The Securities and Exchange Commission's (SEC) Office of Investor Education and Advocacy and the North American Securities Administrators Association (NASAA) are jointly issuing this Investor Bulletin to help investors better understand the titles used by financial professionals. The requirements for obtaining and using these titles vary widely, from rigorous to nothing at all. To use certain titles, a financial professional may need to pass exams, meet ethical standards, have relevant work experience, and undertake continuing education. Other titles, however, may be obtained with little time…

SEC-registered investment advisers who have custody of their clients’ funds or securities must safeguard those funds as required by the SEC’s “custody rule.” The custody rule is designed to provide additional safeguards for investors against the possibility of theft or misappropriation by investment advisers who are registered with the SEC. Despite the protections offered by the custody rule, investors still need to be proactive in ensuring the safety of their investments.

The SEC’s Office of Investor Education and Advocacy is issuing this Investor Bulletin to provide you with guidance on how to read confirmation statements.

The Securities and Exchange Commission approved amendments to FINRA’s rules on January 31, 2011, that will provide customers in all FINRA arbitrations an option of selecting a panel comprised entirely of public arbitrators to serve in customer dispute cases.

The Securities and Exchange Commission approved rules on Sept. 10, 2010, to expand the existing circuit breaker program that currently is triggered by large, sudden price moves in an individual stock. The new rules follow changes adopted on June 10, 2010, that impose a uniform market-wide pause in trading in individual stocks whose price moves 10% or more in a five-minute period. The trading pause, which was proposed by U.S. exchanges and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA), initially was limited to stocks in the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index, but has been extended to stocks…