What You Need to Know

• FINRA warned early this month that the regulatory group’s exams this year would focus on BD filings of SARs.
• Broker-dealer firms should try to bundle together related incidents into one SAR when possible.
• In some situations, firms should file SARs even in situations that involve small amounts of money.

It is more important than ever for broker-dealers to be watchful for fraud and take the proper steps to combat it, including the filing of suspicious activity reports (SARs) when warranted, according to Greg Ruppert, head of National Cause and Financial Crimes Detection Programs at the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority.

The industry currently faces a “perfect storm where globalization and the increase of technology and data, as well as the rise of the internet globally, have come together to really facilitate criminals and fraudsters from operating against firms and against their clients at a much larger scale than ever before,” he said April 20 during the FINRA podcast “At, By or Through: Fraud in the Broker-Dealer Industry.”

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