MSRB aims to raise bar on size transparency for real-time muni trades

By Susanna Moon

Chicago, Aug. 24 - The Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board said investors may soon be able to see the exact par value of municipal trades of up to $5 million in real time. The size limit for exact par value of real-time trades is currently set at $1 million.

For deals more than $5 million, the website would display the exact par value of trades five business days after the trade under the MSRB's proposal. In the meantime, an indicator of "MM+" would be used in place of the exact par value.

The board is aiming to provide for faster dissemination of this information with a proposal to the Securities and Exchange Commission for municipal securities transactions valued between $1 million and $5 million through the MSRB Real-Time Transaction Reporting System (RTRS), according to the MSRB.

RTRS is the centralized system for collection and market-wide dissemination of all transactions in municipal securities by dealers. The data are published on the MSRB's Electronic Municipal Market Access (EMMA) website on a real-time basis for free public access and is also offered on a subscription basis to market data vendors.

Right now, EMMA posts an indicator of "1MM+" for the par value of more than $1 million for five business days.

"The MSRB believes disseminating the exact trade size of all transactions under $5 million in real time is an appropriate first step toward ensuring the fairest and most accurate pricing of municipal securities transactions," MSRB executive director Lynnette Kelly said in the release.

"The MSRB plans to continue to evaluate whether this threshold can be raised further or even eliminated to achieve the goal of more complete and immediate price transparency in the municipal market."

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