SIFMA issued the following statement from president and CEO Kenneth E. Bentsen, Jr. on the order issued by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to reduce operating costs of the Consolidated Audit Trail (CAT):

“SIFMA believes the exemptive relief issued by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), which allows for immediate implementation of much needed changes designed to save millions of dollars in annual operating costs of the Consolidated Audit Trail (CAT), is a long overdue step in the right direction. We have long held the view that ever-increasing CAT costs, lacking any transparency or accountability, is one of many festering problems with the CAT and we commend the SEC for leadership in trying to rein them in.

We also agree with the Chairman that more work needs to be done, including further reducing costs, eliminating investors’ personally identifiable information (PII) and establishing rational governance.  We thank the Chairman for his leadership on this issue and look forward to continued engagement on this issue.”

Source: SIFMA

SEC Issues Order to Reduce Operating Costs of Consolidated Audit Trail

The Securities and Exchange Commission issued an order granting conditional exemptive relief related to certain requirements of the National Market System Plan governing the Consolidated Audit Trail (CAT NMS Plan), Rule 613 of Regulation NMS, and Rule 17a-1 under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. This conditional exemptive relief allows the self-regulatory organizations that are the participants to the CAT NMS Plan to expeditiously and meaningfully reduce the operating costs of the consolidated audit trail (CAT) while maintaining core regulatory functionality.

“Both the Commission and the participants that operate the CAT need to take very seriously their roles in reducing these seemingly endless cost increases. CAT must be more efficient and cost-effective, especially after the recent decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit that vacated the 2023 Funding Model Order governing the CAT,” said SEC Chairman Paul S. Atkins. “While I am pleased to support today’s exemptive relief, I want to reiterate that this is just the start.”

“The Commission action begins an overdue journey to reform and rationalize the CAT. The Division will continue to engage participants and industry members to facilitate needed improvements to reduce costs for investors,” said Jamie Selway, Director of the SEC’s Division of Trading and Markets.

The conditional exemptive relief order expands on previous cost savings measures approved by the Commission and will allow the plan participants to, among other things: (1) cease creating interim lifecycle linkages absent regulator request; (2) ease requirements related to the re-processing of late records; (3) cease providing certain functionality associated with the online targeted query tool; and (4) delete certain CAT data and more cost effectively store older CAT data. The CAT budget originally approved by the Operating Committee of the CAT for 2025 exceeded $248 million. As a result of implementation of previous cost amendments and the relief granted today, CAT’s expenses are approximately forecast to fall an additional $20 million-$27 million below the approximately $196 million forecast expenses for 2025.

Source: SEC