ENINVESTOR RESEARCH, MARKET DATA & FRAUD PREVENTION · OCTOBER 25, 2026
FINRA Adds Market-Research and Scam-Screening Tools for Investors
FINRA launched a Market Data and Investments Explorer and updated its Risk Meter and Scam Meter to help retail investors research securities, companies, funds, market conditions, and potential fraud warning signs.
What FINRA launched
Source publication date: October 13, 2026. FINRA announced a new Market Data and Investments Explorer plus updated Risk Meter and Scam Meter tools. The Explorer integrates investor education with market indexes and data for exchange-traded and over-the-counter equities, exchange-traded funds, mutual funds, and exchange-listed companies. The tools are educational resources; they do not recommend a product, professional, issuer, borrower, or strategy and do not eliminate investment risk.
- 01Research markets and products
- 02Screen risk and scam signals
- 03Verify firms and claims independently
The Explorer combines data with context
Company profiles may include descriptions, prices, valuation and profitability measures, recent news, and SEC filings, while product views provide market and investment information. Data aggregation can make research easier, but users should confirm dates, definitions, corporate actions, issuer filings, fund documents, and source limitations. A displayed security or company profile is not a FINRA endorsement, credit analysis, valuation opinion, or evidence that a financing opportunity is suitable.
The meters organize warning signs, not definitive verdicts
FINRA's updated Risk Meter and Scam Meter are designed to help users recognize characteristics that can increase concern, such as unsolicited contact, urgency, secrecy, unusual payment methods, claims of guaranteed returns, or difficulty verifying a person or product. A low apparent risk score cannot prove legitimacy, and a warning sign requires investigation rather than an assumption. Fraud prevention depends on independent identity, registration, custody, document, and payment verification.
Practical investor takeaway
Use official registration and disciplinary databases, SEC or issuer filings, offering documents, audited information, direct contact details, custodial records, and independently verified wire instructions. Understand fees, liquidity, valuation, leverage, concentration, conflicts, transfer rights, tax treatment, and loss scenarios before committing funds. Borrowers seeking private capital should expect sophisticated investors to verify the sponsor, authority, bank account, collateral, use of proceeds, repayment source, and intermediaries rather than relying on a pitch deck or referral.
Investors should use regulator-provided research and warning tools as a first screen, then independently verify the person, firm, product, issuer, offering documents, fees, liquidity, custody, conflicts, and source of every performance or financing claim.
Discuss a financing need →This independent summary is based on the cited source and is provided for general educational purposes only. Terms and program requirements may change.