Regulator Explores the Collection of Pre-Trade Muni-Bond Prices

-- The municipal bond market’s regulator wants to know whether it should start collecting key price information for certain state and local government securities. “Having a two-sided market is going to be very, very challenging on most munis when they don’t trade that frequently,” said Jesy LeBlanc, co-founder of TRADEliance, a consultancy focusing on trading operations and compliance. Currently dealers typically provide quotes on electronic platforms, but the information is only available to participating banks, asset managers and registered investment advisers and isn’t broadly accessible to the public. The MSRB’s free Electronic Municipal Market Access website, or EMMA, reports muni-bond trades to the public 15 minutes after they’re executed.