March 2002 NASD Arbitration Statistics

Filings Up Again

NASD STATS, 2/02

The formal tally for the first two months of 2002 indicates that NASD-DR recorded 20% more cases submitted for arbitration than for the same period last year. The 14% statistic that we reported last week in SAA 02-11 applies to the number of cases closed; newly opened cases number 1,193 already, which compares with 991 in 2001 and 873 for the first two months of 2000.

In fact, this 20% increase is a bit off the pace of the last quarter of 2001, when more than 1,900 cases were submitted to the forum.

Mediation has started the year with a boost in new “cases in agreement.” There are 225 additional cases for January and February, compared with 186 for the same period in 2001. There were 246 cases closed in mediation, a 21% jump over the comparable figure of 204 in 2001. In comparison, while there were 946 cases closed on the arbitration side, only 284 of those cases were decisions by arbitrators and some 206 of those were customer-related matters. 63 of those decided customer cases were referred to arbitrators who rendered awards “on the papers” or without a formal hearing.

In both “paper” cases and hearing cases, customers enjoyed a 59% “win” rate during the opening two months of 2002, versus an average 44% and 53% “win” rate for customers in 2001 “paper” and hearing cases, respectively.

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