December 28, 2021
NYSE Proposes Offering More “Freebies” to Listed Co’s
In addition to the proposed changes to NYSE listing fees, the SEC also posted notice of a proposed NYSE rule change to Section 907.00 of the Listed Company Manual. Companies that list on the Exchange after the rule is approved by the Commission will be eligible to sign up for an expanded list of “complimentary products & services” for 4 years after listing, which include:
– Market Intelligence – Replacing the current offering of “market surveillance,” in light of the fact that the NYSE’s contracted service providers now provide additional info to track investor views and how they change over time
– Web-hosting & Web-casting – Combining two separate services, since the NYSE’s service providers now aggregate them as a single option
– Board of Directors Platform
– Virtual Event Platform
– ESG Tools
– News Distribution Products & Services
If approved, the rule change also would give companies more flexibility to select different levels of services – subject to a maximum overall value of services used. Eligible new listings & eligible transfers with a global market cap of $400 million or more can get:
Products & services with a maximum combined value of approximately $125k annually, consisting of: (i) web-hosting & web-casting, (ii) news distribution, and (iii) a selection among market intelligence, market analytics, board of directors platform, virtual event platform, or ESG products & services.
Companies below a $400 million market cap are limited to:
(i) web-hosting & web-casting, (ii) market analytics, and (iii) news distribution.
The Exchange would extend its existing complimentary whistleblower hotline services from 24 to 48 months for all new listings.
For currently listed companies, the “Tier One” group – companies with more than 270 million shares outstanding – can get (i) web-hosting & web-casting, and (ii) a selection from the other services, up to an annual value of $75k. Tier Two is too complicated for this blog.
Comments are due 21 days after publication in the Federal Register – here’s the form.
– Liz Dunshee