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Federal Securities Law Research Guide: Releases and No-Action Letters

Sources at the BLS Library for Primary and Secondary Material Related to Federal Securities Law

SEC Releases

The SEC periodically issues several types of releases, including litigation releases, concept releases, and interpretive releases.  SEC interpretive releases contain views of the SEC staff and interpret the federal securities laws and SEC regulations.  Releases are issued in sequentially numbered formats, using a prefix for each type of release.  For example, the prefix used to delineate the Securities Act of 1933 is "33."  Thus, an SEC release under that Act would be numbered 33-xxxx.

SEC releases are available in the following sources:

 

Manual of Publicly Available Telephone Interpretations

Manual of Publicly Available Telephone Interpretations - Since 1997, the SEC has posted its Manual of Publicly Available Telephone Interpretations online. Also searchable on Westlaw, the manual contains interpretations of various SEC regulations. As to their legal status, these responses are not rules, regulations, or statements of the SEC.

No-Action Letters

An individual or entity who is not certain whether a particular product, service, or action would constitute a violation of the federal securities laws may request a "no-action" letter from the SEC staff.  Most no-action letters describe the request, analyze the particular facts and circumstances involved, discuss applicable laws and rules, and, if the staff grants the request for no action, concludes that the SEC staff would not recommend that the Commission take enforcement action against the requester based on the facts and representations described in the individual's or entity's original letter.

No-action letters are available in the following sources: