The House of Representatives passed the National Securities Exchange Regulatory Parity Act (H.R. 5421), which amends the Securities Act to clarify that the exemption from state registration provided by Section 18(b) of the Securities Act with respect to securities listed on the NYSE, the Amex (now called NYSE Mkt LLC) or Nasdaq applies equally to securities listed on all other national exchanges.

The primary objective of the legislation is to (i) strike references to particular stock exchanges in the Securities Act, and (ii) extend the "blue sky" exemption from state-based registration to all SEC-registered national securities exchanges with listing standards approved by the SEC.

Commentary

Given that all of the exchanges have fairly similar listing requirements, there is no reason to continue the favoritism that is currently provided to these three exchanges. The approval of this Act simply gives all national exchanges equal treatment.

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