How to Read FINRA BrokerCheck Reports, Complete Guide

PlainAdvisorCheck Editorial Published April 6, 2026

FINRA BrokerCheck reports contain a wealth of information about brokers and broker-dealer firms. Here's how to interpret each section.

What Is a BrokerCheck Report?

BrokerCheck reports are public disclosure documents that FINRA maintains for all registered brokers and broker-dealer firms. Brokers are legally required to disclose certain events to FINRA via Form U4 (for individuals) and Form BD (for firms). This information is then made publicly available through BrokerCheck.

Individual Broker Reports: Key Sections

1. Summary Section

Shows the broker's current registration status, years in the industry, and a high-level count of disclosures. This is your quick-glance indicator.

2. Disclosure Events

This is the most important section. Disclosures fall into several categories:

Regulatory actions: Sanctions, fines, or suspensions from FINRA, the SEC, or state regulators
Customer disputes: Complaints or arbitrations filed by clients, including settled and pending cases
Civil judicial actions: Lawsuits or court proceedings
Criminal disclosures: Charges or convictions, any criminal history is a serious red flag
Financial disclosures: Bankruptcies, judgments, or liens
Employment terminations: Fired for cause, which triggers disclosure requirements

3. Registration and License History

Shows all firms where the broker has been registered, when, and for how long. A pattern of short stays at many firms ("cockroach brokers") can be a warning sign.

4. Exam History

Lists passed exams and licenses. Series 7 (general securities), Series 65/66 (investment adviser), and Series 63 (state law) are common.

Firm Reports: What to Look For

Firm-level BrokerCheck reports show aggregate data about the entire firm, not individual brokers. Key items:

Disclosure flag: Whether the firm has ANY disclosures on record
Regulatory events: Firm-level FINRA or SEC sanctions
Civil events: Lawsuits against the firm
Arbitrations: Customer disputes resolved through FINRA's arbitration process

Understanding Disclosure Severity

Not all disclosures are equal. Context matters:

A single settled customer complaint from 20 years ago is very different from 10 recent regulatory sanctions
Look at the dollar amounts of settlements and fines
Regulatory actions (from FINRA/SEC directly) are generally more serious than customer complaints
Any criminal disclosure should be treated as a major red flag

How PlainAdvisorCheck Grades Firms

PlainAdvisorCheck's A-F grades are size-normalized. A firm with no reportable disclosures earns an A. Firms that do carry disclosures are ranked by disclosure intensity, their weighted disclosure load per branch office, against same-size peers. This accounts for scale: a 1,000-office national firm with 50 disclosures (0.05 per office) is generally healthier than a 5-office firm with 10 disclosures (2.0 per office), even though the national firm has more disclosures in absolute terms.

Grades:

A: Zero or <2% disclosure rate
B: 2-5% disclosure rate
C: 5-10% disclosure rate
D: 10-20% disclosure rate
F: >20% disclosure rate

Always verify at FINRA BrokerCheck for the full, current record.

Disclaimer: This guide is for educational purposes only. Not investment advice. Data accuracy depends on FINRA reporting requirements. Always verify with FINRA directly.

Frequently asked questions

Where does this data come from?

All figures on this page derive from official public records, primarily FINRA BrokerCheck and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC EDGAR enforcement releases and the Investment Adviser Public Disclosure database). We cite the underlying agency and series in the methodology section. No proprietary aggregators are used.

How often are figures updated?

Each series follows its own publication cadence. We refresh our database within 30 days of each upstream release. Specific update timestamps appear in the page footer where available; the methodology page documents the cadence per data series.

Can I use this data for my own analysis?

Yes. The underlying federal data is public domain. Our presentation, calculations, and editorial commentary are licensed for individual reference. For commercial republication or large-scale data extraction, contact us at the email listed on the contact page.

What if the figures here disagree with another source?

Different sources use different methodologies, definitions, geographic boundaries, and reference periods, disagreement is normal and informative. Our methodology page documents exactly which series and reference period we use for each metric, so you can reproduce or audit the figures against the upstream agency directly.

Compare firms Side by side Methodology How we computed this Research Original analysis By state Drill into your jurisdiction

Worked example: parsing a real disclosure record

A typical FINRA BrokerCheck disclosure entry has six fields: disclosure type, status, initiated date, settled/resolved date, allegation summary, and resolution. Consider this synthetic-but-typical entry: "Customer Dispute, Settled, initiated 2018-04-12, settled 2019-08-30, alleges unsuitable recommendation in variable annuity, settled for $32,500 without admission." Three reading rules apply. First, "Settled" without admission is the most common outcome and does not establish guilt. Second, the gap between initiation and settlement (16 months here) often correlates with case complexity rather than fault. Third, an allegation tied to variable annuities or non-traded REITs deserves particular attention, the SEC has flagged these as high-complaint product categories for over a decade.

Field-by-field reference table

BrokerCheck field	What it means	Red-flag threshold
Customer Disputes	Investor-initiated complaints	2+ in last 5 years
Regulatory Events	SEC/FINRA/state actions	Any
Employment Separations After Allegations	U5 termination tied to allegation	Any
Civil Events	Court judgments or settlements	Awards above $25,000
Criminal Disclosures	Felony/misdemeanor charges	Any non-traffic
Financial Disclosures	Bankruptcies, liens	Within 10 years
Bond Disclosures	Surety bond denials	Any

FINRA BrokerCheck is the single most-underused tool in retail investor protection, every dollar spent on retirement planning should be paired with five minutes spent on brokercheck.finra.org.

Cross-referencing with state regulators

BrokerCheck only captures FINRA-registered broker-dealers and their representatives. If your advisor is purely an investment adviser, you must also check SEC IAPD. Smaller advisers (under $100 million AUM) are typically registered with their state securities division rather than the SEC. The NASAA member directory links to all 50 state regulators, and state-level records sometimes include disclosures that federal databases lack, particularly for advisers who moved between firms across state lines. Confirming coverage across both federal and state systems takes roughly $0 in fees and 15 minutes of time, and can surface regulatory history that a federal-only search alone would miss.

Compiled by PlainAdvisorCheck Editorial, Financial Advisor Discipline Editorial Team

Every figure on PlainAdvisorCheck is rendered directly from FINRA BrokerCheck and SEC IAPD disciplinary records, no number is typed in by an editor. This page draws directly on FINRA BrokerCheck and SEC EDGAR data, no figure is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error.