ASA case challenging MSRB's constitutionality voluntarily dismissed

The American Securities Association's case against the Securities and Exchange Commission in which the ASA had argued that an SEC order should be scrapped because the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board was "unconstitutionally structured" is over.

A federal appeals court order Tuesday dismissed the case following a Dec. 1 filing in which the parties jointly stipulated to voluntary dismissal of the appeal, filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. In November 2024, the ASA had petitioned the court for a review of an SEC order granting approval of a proposed rule change to amend MSRB Rule G-14 to shorten the timeframe for reporting trades in municipal securities. In June, the MSRB announced that the board had decided to rescind the one-minute trade reporting standard and leave the existing 15-minute standard in place. The SEC approved the reversal, which ASA said led to the group agreeing to drop the lawsuit.

"We sued to take a stand against the SROs on principle," an ASA spokesperson said Wednesday in a reference to both the MSRB and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority. "They quickly realized how bad a political decision they had made and took action to reverse course. Once the SEC approved that reversal, we dropped the case."