An economic release calendar provided by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis is available at https://fred.stlouisfed.org/releases/calendar, which is a third-party website.
The MSRB is not affiliated with the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. There is no MSRB sponsorship, approval or endorsement of the third-party website or its services
(nor, vice versa, is there any by the third party of EMMA or its services).
Find answers below to some of the basic questions about how EMMA works, what are
the key features of municipal securities, how you should read an official statement
and how to understand the price and other terms of a bond trade.
EMMA makes publicly available free copies of official statements and advance refunding documents
received by the MSRB from underwriters of municipal securities since 1990. EMMA is the official
repository for continuing disclosures made by issuers and obligated persons throughout the life
of municipal securities. EMMA provides free access to price data for municipal securities trades
reported to the MSRB since January 31, 2005. EMMA also offers free public access to tools,
statistics and resources for evaluating broader municipal market trends.
No. Official statements are not produced for every municipal securities offering,
and a limited number of offerings for which official statements are produced are
exempt from the filing requirement under MSRB rules. In general, a broker-dealer
or bank cannot underwrite a new issue of municipal securities unless it receives
an official statement from the issuer under the rules of the Securities and Exchange
Commission. This requirement does not apply in four cases:
where the size of the new issue is $1 million or less;
where bonds can be sold to investors in units of no smaller than $100,000 ("$100,000
minimum denomination") and are sold to no more than 35 "sophisticated" investors
(known as a "limited offering");
where bonds are sold in $100,000 minimum denomination and mature in nine months
or less from initial issuance; and
where bonds are sold in $100,000 minimum denomination and the bond owners can require
the issuer to purchase back the bonds at face value every nine months or more frequently.
Although not required to be produced, official statements often are in fact produced
for these exempted new issues and, in most such cases, the official statements will
be available through EMMA. However, in the case of a limited offering, even if an
official statement is produced, the underwriter is not required to submit the official
statement to the MSRB since such offering may have been designed as a private offering
not intended for offer to the general public.
No. The MSRB receives, and EMMA publicly provides, the basic escrow documentation
(known as "advance refunding documents") relating to most advance refundings of outstanding
bonds. This does not cover all instances in which a bond is being refunded or refinanced.
When an existing bond is refinanced with proceeds of the sale of new bonds, that is
considered a refunding. An advance refunding occurs where the proceeds of the new bonds
cannot be applied immediately to pay off the existing bonds but instead is held in
escrow for a period of 90 days or more before the proceeds are used to pay off the
bonds. The advance refunding documents available from EMMA represent cases in which
the refunding is an advance refunding, where the escrow arrangements are set out in
a written document, and the underwriter for the new bonds has submitted an official
statement to the MSRB. Refundings where the pay off occurs in less than 90 days is
a "current refunding" for which no advance refunding document is required. Also,
issuers sometimes refinance existing bonds using moneys other than proceeds of new
bonds (for example, if a bond-financed public facility is sold, the proceeds of that
property sale may be used to pay off the existing bonds). In such a case, no advance
refunding document exists.
No. Although information on virtually all trades in municipal bonds and notes since
January 31, 2005, is available on EMMA, there are certain exceptions. The MSRB's
Real-Time Transaction Reporting system (RTRS) only receives reports of trades in
municipal securities for which a CUSIP number has been assigned and does not receive
reports of trades in 529 savings plans and other municipal fund securities. Thus,
no trade price information for this limited universe of municipal securities is
provided on EMMA. In addition, a limited number of special-purpose transactions
where the broker-dealer or bank involved in the transaction reports that the price
was negotiated "away from the market" are not made available on EMMA.
See other frequently asked questions
about trade prices
EMMA provides free access to documents and trade price information relating to municipal
securities reported to the MSRB, together with basic indexing information necessary
to find these documents and information. EMMA does not provide analyses or summaries
of these documents and trade information. A number of private sector firms offer
analytic services in connection with the municipal securities market. In addition,
EMMA provides information solely relating to municipal securities. Many securities
or other financial products that may offer tax-advantages are not municipal securities
and therefore are not covered by EMMA.
Like tax-exempt mutual funds, most municipal derivatives are not municipal securities
themselves (and in fact often are not securities at all), even though they may be
created from an underlying municipal security. Broker-dealers and banks are not
required to submit information to the MSRB concerning such municipal derivatives
and therefore information generally is not made available through EMMA. However,
you may find listings of some types of derivatives that share similar CUSIP numbers
with municipal issuers. Very limited trade information for some derivatives may
be found on EMMA; however, since broker-dealers and banks are not required to report
derivative trades, you should be aware that any derivatives trade data you find
on EMMA may represent an incomplete list of trades in such product.
The MSRB does not review or approve the information contained in the official statements
or advance refunding documents submitted by underwriters to the MSRB, nor does the MSRB
review continuing disclosure documents submitted by issuers, obligated persons and their
agents. All information contained therein remains the responsibility of the parties
preparing such documents. Transaction data available on EMMA is provided to the MSRB by
broker-dealers and banks involved in those transactions and such firms are responsible
for the timely and accurate submission of all relevant information in connection with the
transactions. The data and information accessible through third-party tools and resources
(such as yield curves and indices) for evaluating municipal market trends are not the
responsibility of the MSRB.
There is no restriction on who may use EMMA. Bulk users of municipal securities
data who wish to obtain the documents and information provided on EMMA on a more
efficient basis may subscribe with the MSRB to receive such documents and information
directly from the MSRB. All or portions of these materials also may be available
on a commercial basis from existing MSRB subscribers. Subscription information (including
fees for subscription services) is available from the MSRB. Data Subscription Services and Products
There are two ways to find trade data on EMMA. When you search for information on a
specific municipal security, you will ultimately arrive at a Security Detail page.
On that page, click on the "Trade Activity" tab to view any trade information available
for reportable trades in that security occurring on or after January 31, 2005. You may
also find trade data covering all securities trades in the municipal securities market
by navigating to the Market Activity tab, clicking on Trade Activity and viewing the
"Recent Trades" tab.
The key items of information regarding trades provided on EMMA include the trade
price, the resulting yield (if available), the principal amount of the bonds bought
or sold in that trade, and whether the trade involved a customer or was between
broker-dealers and/or banks.
Price is traditionally shown as a percentage of the principal amount of a bond.
Thus, if $10,000 in principal amount of a municipal bond is traded and the purchase
price of the bond is $10,000, the price is shown as 100%. If the purchaser instead
has paid $9,950 for that bond (that is, if the bond is purchased at a "discount"),
the price is noted as 99.5%. If the purchaser instead has paid $10,100 for that
bond (that is, if the bond is purchased at a "premium"), then the price is noted
as 101%.
Certain bonds do not pay interest periodically, but instead are sold at a deep discount
from par and gain value until they mature. These are called "zero-coupon" or "capital
appreciation" bonds. The yield of the transaction is shown, but since there are
no periodic interest payments, the interest rate or coupon is zero. Variable rate
demand notes, auction rate securities and other types of bonds that do not have
a fixed interest rate generally are displayed with a blank in the interest rate
field. EMMA users should note that this convention may not have been universally
applied for all such securities and therefore it is possible that a variable rate
security may sometimes show a zero for interest rate and a zero-coupon bond may
sometimes show a blank.
A trade whose principal value (par value or face value) is more than $5 million is shown as "MM+"
for the first week after trade date. Reporting the exact value of these large trades, which typically
are done by institutional investors, could reveal the identity of the investor, since some market
members may know who owns large blocks of a bond. This could make investors less likely to do large
trades, which in turn could adversely affect the liquidity of the bond. After one week, the MM+
indicator is replaced by the exact value of each such trade on EMMA.
The yield of a fixed-rate municipal bond varies inversely with the price. In other
words, when comparing two trades in a bond that are at different prices, the higher
price results in a lower yield and vice versa.
Yield is computed by the MSRB for both customer and inter-dealer trades. Typically, EMMA shows the yield on all trades, but there are exceptions, including
bonds that pay variable rates of interest and some trades in fixed-interest bonds conducted during the "new issue" period, when all information needed
to compute yield may not yet have been determined.
Many municipal bonds are traded infrequently, and most municipal securities are
not traded on a given day. Rather, investors are holding them. Since the most recent
sale may have been some time ago and market conditions may have changed since then,
the value of a bond may have changed since its last sale.
Normally, broker-dealers and banks report their trades to the MSRB within 15 minutes of
trade execution, and the trade information appears almost immediately on EMMA. However,
various factors may impair this "real-time" transparency. Infrequently, broker-dealers
and banks are late in reporting a trade. Also, a small number of securities are permitted
to be reported in longer than 15 minutes. For example, on the first day of trading of a new
issue of municipal securities, a sale by an underwriter of the bonds at the published list
offering price, and certain inter-dealer sales by an underwriter at a discount to other
broker-dealers or banks participating in the primary distribution of the securities, may
be reported at the end of the trading day. Trades in various types of short-term instruments,
including variable rate demand notes, auction rate securities and commercial paper, also
may be reported at the end of the trading day.
Assuming you have correctly searched for your security, it is possible that your
trade does not appear on EMMA. This might happen if the broker-dealer or bank has
not yet reported the trade, either because an exception to the 15-minute rule applies
or because of a failure to comply with the reporting requirement. Also, even if
the broker-dealer or bank has reported the trade in a timely manner, it may have
made an error in how or what it reported on that trade, such as omitting required
information. A major error in reporting causes a trade to be rejected from the reporting
system until the broker-dealer or bank corrects the trade report, in large measure
to ensure that inaccurate price reporting is not disseminated to the public.
First, you should be sure that the trade you are looking at is your own trade and
not a similar one, which can happen with some regularity, especially with new issues.
If you have determined that it is in fact your trade, it is possible that the broker-dealer
or bank has made an error when reporting the trade to the MSRB. The MSRB's Real-Time
Transaction Reporting System screens out obvious errors but relies on the broker-dealer
or bank to correctly report all the details of each trade. Finally, the broker-dealer
or bank may have reported the trade correctly to the MSRB but made an error on your
customer confirmation. Check with your broker-dealer or bank about any discrepancies.
The requirement for underwriters to provide copies of official statements to the
MSRB only took effect for offerings occurring in 1990 or later. Thus, if an official
statement for a new issue was prepared prior to 1990, such official statement will
not be available from EMMA. Also, some offerings occurring in 1990 or later are
exempt from the filing requirement under MSRB rules. In general, a broker-dealer
or bank cannot underwrite a new issue of municipal securities unless it receives
an official statement from the issuer under the rules of the Securities and Exchange
Commission. This requirement does not apply in four cases:
- where the size of the new issue is $1 million or less;
- where bonds can be sold to investors in units of no smaller than $100,000 ("$100,000
minimum denomination") and are sold to no more than 35 "sophisticated" investors;
- where bonds are sold in $100,000 minimum denomination and mature in nine months
or less from initial issuance; and
- where bonds are sold in $100,000 minimum denomination and the bond owners can
require the issuer to purchase back the bonds at face value every nine months or
more frequently.
An advance refunding document does not exist in every case in which bonds are being
refunded. A bond can be refunded in what is called a "current" refunding, in which
the bonds are paid off either immediately upon issuance of the refunding bonds or
within 90 days of issuance. In such cases, an advance refunding document typically
is not used or, if one exists, is not required to be submitted to the MSRB. In some
cases, the legal documents under which the outstanding bonds were issued may provide
a mechanism for advance refunding bonds that does not require the establishment
of an escrow under a separate document, in which case no advance refunding document
may exist. In other cases, an escrow may be established for outstanding bonds from
moneys available to the issuer other than from the issuance of advance refunding
bonds, such as where an issuer sells a bond-financed facility and then applies the
proceeds of that sale to repay the original bonds. No advance refunding documents
are required to be filed with the MSRB if no advance refunding bonds were issued
to refund the old bonds, or if the underwriter is otherwise exempted from submitting
an official statement to the MSRB under exemptions provided under MSRB and SEC rules.
Finally, underwriters were not required to submit advance refunding documents to
the MSRB prior to 1990.
On June 1, 2009, the MSRB began collecting on a voluntary basis continuing disclosures
provided by municipal issuers and other obligated persons; beginning on July 1, 2009,
issuers and others responsible for making disclosures on their behalf are required to
submit these documents to the MSRB. Before July 1, 2009, issuers and obligated persons
were required to provide continuing disclosure information to the "nationally
recognized municipal securities information repositories" designated as such by the SEC
pursuant to its Rule 15c2-12. In addition, in certain states, issuers and obligated
persons also provided such information to "state information depositories." These
NRMSIRs and SIDs are identified on the SEC's website and should be contacted directly
if you wish to review information they were provided by issuers and obligated persons.
Such information also may be available for some securities through other commercial
information services or directly from the issuer or other obligated person. See
Municipal Securities Information Sources at
SEC Website.
The descriptions included in the FAQs above are generalizations and do not necessarily
accurately represent the terms of any specific security.
You must read the disclosure
materials and other relevant documents to fully understand your security.
As further described in our Privacy Policy, this website uses cookies and we may collect and use certain personal information. By clicking Accept, you agree to our use of cookies and Privacy Policy.