FINRA Rule 2210 Proposal: Risk-Based Supervision for Retail Communications, Social Media and AI

What broker-dealers should know about FINRA Regulatory Notice 26-14, proposed changes to retail communication review, advertising filings, AI tools and social media supervision

At a Glance: FINRA Regulatory Notice 26-14 proposes modernizing FINRA Rule 2210 by replacing default principal pre-use approval for many retail communications with a written, risk-based supervisory framework. The proposal would affect broker-dealer advertising review, social media supervision, AI-generated communications, filing obligations and communications containing recommendations.

Executive Summary

A Shift to Risk-Based Review

On July 9, 2026, FINRA issued Regulatory Notice 26-14 seeking comment on a substantial modernization of FINRA Rule 2210, the rule governing member communications with the public. The proposal is not yet effective and does not alter any firm’s present obligations. If adopted, however, it would replace the current prescriptive principal pre-use approval requirement for most retail communications with a written, risk-based supervisory framework tailored to the member’s business, size, products, communication channels and risk profile. Comments are due September 11, 2026. The proposal is consequential because it would move Rule 2210 away from a transaction-by-transaction approval model and toward an outcomes-based supervisory model. Firms could devote more rigorous pre-use review to higher-risk communications and use surveillance, sampling, post-use review and technology for lower-risk communications. That flexibility would come with a corresponding obligation to demonstrate that the firm’s procedures were reasonably designed, implemented, documented, tested and followed.

What the Proposal Would Change

The proposal also would eliminate the current static-versus-interactive distinction for social media, expressly address the supervision of communications created or reviewed through artificial intelligence tools, revise certain filing requirements, and replace the detailed provisions governing past specific recommendations with a fair-and-balanced standard more closely aligned with the SEC’s Investment Adviser Marketing Rule.

What Would Stay the Same

The substantive content standards would remain unchanged: communications must continue to be fair and balanced and may not contain false, exaggerated, unwarranted, promissory or misleading statements.

Why Firms Should Act During the Comment Period

Member firms should use the comment period to assess the proposal rather than wait for a final rule. The notice provides a useful roadmap for examining current advertising governance, communication inventories, principal-review practices, AI controls, influencer arrangements, surveillance capabilities and recordkeeping. Firms also should determine whether the proposed framework would reduce burdens for their business or instead create material implementation costs, particularly for smaller firms that presently rely on universal principal approval as a straightforward control.

Key Takeaways for Broker-Dealers

The proposal would materially change how firms design, document and evidence their communications-supervision programs. Key points include:

• Pre-use approval: Most retail communications would no longer require principal approval before first use. Each firm would decide, through written risk-based procedures, which categories remain subject to pre-use review.
• Supervisory evidence: Training, surveillance, follow-up, implementation records and evidence that procedures were carried out would become central examination evidence.
• Social media: The static-versus-interactive distinction would be removed. Risk would be assessed based on content, audience, distribution method, preparer, endorsement and product characteristics.
• AI tools: Firms would remain responsible for all communications. AI tools could support generation or supervision only if appropriately vetted, tested, monitored and governed.
• Advertising filings: FINRA would modify the first-year filing period and permit certain investment-company ranking and comparison communications to be filed after first use.
• Recommendations: Detailed recommendation-specific requirements would be replaced with a fair-and-balanced presentation standard, without changing Regulation Best Interest or the general Rule 2210 content standards.

Background: Why FINRA Is Reconsidering Rule 2210

Rule 2210 classifies written communications as retail communications, correspondence or institutional communications. Under the current framework, an appropriately qualified registered principal generally must approve retail communications before the earlier of use or filing, subject to specified exceptions. Correspondence and institutional communications may be supervised under more flexible procedures. FINRA states that the existing framework has become difficult to apply to modern communication practices. Social media posts may be simultaneously persistent, shareable and interactive. Automated and AI-assisted communications may be generated at a scale and speed that make item-by-item pre-use approval impractical. Dually registered firms also face overlapping but not identical broker-dealer and investment-adviser requirements. Regulatory Notice 26-14 therefore proposes a structure intended to preserve investor protection while permitting firms to allocate supervisory resources according to actual communications risk. Importantly, the notice is a request for comment. Existing Rule 2210 remains in force unless and until FINRA files a proposed rule change with the SEC, the SEC publishes the proposal for comment, and the change becomes effective. Firms should therefore continue applying their current principal-approval, filing, content-review and recordkeeping procedures.

From Universal Pre-Use Approval to Risk-Based Supervision

The proposed supervisory standard would require a member to establish written procedures appropriate to its business, size and structure for determining which categories of retail communications require principal pre-use approval. The procedures would have to be reasonably designed to ensure compliance with applicable content standards. If the firm does not require pre-use review of every retail communication, the procedures also must address education and training, documentation of that training, surveillance, follow-up and evidence that the procedures were implemented and carried out. FINRA identifies a nonexclusive set of risk factors that firms should consider when designing the framework:

• Product or service complexity: The nature and complexity of the product or service, including the preparer’s familiarity with it.
• Preparer qualifications: The qualifications and experience of the communication preparer and any person paid for, involved in, or endorsing the content.
• Recommendations or promotion: Whether the communication makes a financial or investment recommendation or promotes the firm’s product or service.
• Third-party products or affiliates: Whether the communication promotes an affiliate or third-party product or service.
• Audience targeting: Whether the communication appears tailored to a specific audience or individual.
• Performance, rankings or comparisons: Whether it includes performance information, rankings or comparisons.
• Distribution method: The medium and method of distribution.
• Compliance history: The firm’s or associated person’s history of communications-related concerns.

Together, these factors point toward a tiered supervisory architecture.

Higher-Risk Communications

Firms may continue to require principal pre-use approval for higher-risk communications, including performance advertising, complex products, recommendations, communications prepared by inexperienced personnel, paid endorsements, retail research reports and content directed to vulnerable or narrowly targeted audiences.

Lower-Risk Communications

Lower-risk communications may be better suited for sampling, post-use review or automated surveillance. Examples could include factual updates, recurring administrative notices or previously approved templates, provided the firm’s procedures support that treatment.

Regulatory Focus

The central compliance question would not be whether one firm selected the same review model as another. Instead, regulators would likely focus on whether the firm can explain and substantiate its classification methodology, show that higher-risk communications received appropriate review, and produce evidence that training, monitoring, escalation and corrective-action processes operated as written.

Social Media Supervision: Retiring the Static-Interactive Divide

Why the Current Distinction Is Breaking Down

Current FINRA guidance distinguishes static social media content, which generally requires principal pre-use approval, from interactive content, which may be supervised more flexibly. FINRA acknowledges that platform design and user behavior have blurred that distinction. A post may remain available indefinitely while also permitting immediate comments, sharing, reactions and direct engagement.

A Single Risk-Based Standard for Social Media

The proposal would remove the distinction and evaluate social media under the same risk-based standard as other retail communications. Firms would consider the platform, distribution method, audience, content, product, preparer, endorsement and the communication’s recommendation or promotional features.

Influencer Content Remains High-Risk

This should reduce classification disputes, but it would not make social media presumptively lower risk. FINRA specifically highlights financial influencers. Firms should expect continued focus on whether they have adopted or become entangled with third-party content, whether compensation and conflicts are appropriately disclosed, whether the influencer is qualified to make the statements presented, and whether the firm can supervise and retain the communications.

What Firms Should Document

A risk-based framework would require documented decisions about when influencer content demands pre-use approval, heightened monitoring or prohibition.

AI-Generated and AI-Supervised Communications

FINRA’s Technology-Neutral Position

FINRA reiterates its technology-neutral position: a member is responsible for its communications regardless of whether a person or an automated tool generated the content. The proposal recognizes, however, that applying universal pre-use approval to high-volume, dynamic communications may be operationally difficult and potentially inconsistent with the use of technology to review or approve content.

Using AI in a Supervisory System

FINRA contemplates that AI tools may be incorporated into a reasonably designed supervisory system if they are vetted, tested and monitored. Firms using such tools should consider an enterprise governance framework addressing, at a minimum:

• Use-case controls: Permitted use cases and prohibited uses.
• Vendor and model diligence: Model and vendor due diligence, including data provenance and contractual controls.
• Rule and policy validation: Validation against Rule 2210 content standards and firm-specific policies.
• Human review: Human review and escalation for higher-risk outputs.
• Content-quality controls: Controls addressing inaccurate or fabricated content, inconsistent disclosures and inappropriate recommendations.
• Confidentiality safeguards: Protection of customer, firm and confidential information.
• Change management: Version control, change management and monitoring for performance drift.
• Record retention: Books-and-records retention sufficient to reconstruct the communication and supervisory review.

Responsibility Remains With the Firm

The proposed framework would permit flexibility, but responsibility would remain with the member firm rather than shift to a technology provider. A firm that relies on an automated tool to generate or review communications should be prepared to explain the tool’s purpose, testing, limitations, exception handling and continuing oversight.

For higher-risk communications, automated review may supplement rather than replace qualified principal judgment.

Proposed Changes to FINRA Advertising Filing Requirements

Regulatory Notice 26-14 proposes two principal filing changes:

• New members: The one-year filing period would begin with the first communication filing after the CRD effective date.
• Investment-company rankings and comparisons: Certain retail communications would move from pre-use filing to filing within ten business days after first use or publication.

New-Member Filing Period

The one-year filing period applicable to new members would begin when the member makes its first communication filing after its CRD effective date, rather than on the effective date itself. FINRA explains that many new firms do not begin advertising immediately; starting the period with the first filing would ensure that FINRA reviews a full year of actual communications activity.

Post-Use Filing for Certain Rankings and Comparisons

Retail communications concerning registered investment companies that include self-published performance rankings or comparisons would move from pre-use filing to filing within ten business days after first use or publication. FINRA cites a relatively low historical noncompliance rate for this category and believes post-use filing would reduce distribution delays while preserving oversight.

Post-Use Filing Does Not Eliminate Liability

The proposal would not eliminate liability for a deficient communication distributed before FINRA review. A member would remain responsible for the content and could face remediation costs or enforcement exposure if the communication were misleading or the supervisory procedures were not reasonably designed. Firms therefore should not equate post-use filing with reduced substantive review.

Security-Futures Communications

FINRA also proposes a technical change relating to security-futures communications because a comparable pre-use filing requirement already exists under Rule 2215. The notice indicates that the proposal would not change the underlying security-futures filing requirement.

Communications Containing Recommendations

Current Rule 2210 Recommendation Requirements

Current Rule 2210(d)(7) imposes specific requirements on retail communications that include securities recommendations or refer to profitable past recommendations.

Proposed Fair-and-Balanced Standard

FINRA proposes deleting those detailed provisions and replacing them with a general prohibition against referring to a past specific recommendation unless the presentation is fair and balanced. FINRA would rely on Rule 2210’s general content standards to require the disclosures and context necessary to avoid a misleading presentation.

Alignment With the SEC Marketing Rule

The approach is intended to align broker-dealer communications more closely with the SEC Investment Adviser Marketing Rule, which prohibits references to specific investment advice that are not presented fairly and in balance.

Reg BI Would Still Apply

The proposal would not displace Regulation Best Interest. A communication that constitutes a recommendation to a retail customer would remain subject to Reg BI, and the firm’s associated-person, disclosure, care, conflict-of-interest and compliance obligations would continue to apply.

Dually registered firms therefore should avoid assuming that harmonized advertising language eliminates the need to analyze the capacity in which a communication is made and the separate legal standards that attach to that capacity.

What Would Not Change Under FINRA Rule 2210

The proposal is principally about supervisory architecture and selected filing and disclosure mechanics. It would not change the foundational Rule 2210 content standards. Firms would continue to be responsible for ensuring that communications:

• Are based on principles of fair dealing and good faith.
• Are fair and balanced and provide a sound basis for evaluating the facts concerning a product or service.
• Do not omit material facts where the omission would make the communication misleading.
• Do not contain false, exaggerated, unwarranted, promissory or misleading statements or claims.
• Comply with product-specific, performance, testimonial, recommendation and disclosure requirements that remain applicable.

The proposal also would retain principal pre-use review for retail research reports. FINRA’s endnotes explain that this requirement could continue to be satisfied by a supervisory analyst, even though references to that registration category would be removed from Rule 2210 because Rule 1220 addresses supervisory analyst functions more comprehensively.

Economic and Operational Implications for Member Firms

Potential Efficiencies

FINRA’s preliminary economic analysis suggests that firms producing large volumes of lower-risk retail communications could realize meaningful efficiencies by reducing repetitive principal review.

Implementation Costs and Small-Firm Burdens

At the same time, members may incur substantial implementation costs to develop risk taxonomies, written procedures, training, surveillance, documentation and testing. Smaller firms may face particular resource constraints, although they could elect to retain universal pre-use approval if that remains the more practical and less costly control.

FINRA Filing Data Underscores Compliance Risk

The notice’s data underscore the continuing compliance risk:

• Pre-use filings reviewed: FINRA reviewed 4,501 retail communications filed before first use from 2023 through 2025.
• Post-use filings reviewed: FINRA reviewed 172,898 retail communications filed after first use during the same period.
• Noncompliance rates: FINRA reported noncompliance in 24 percent of pre-use filings and 10 percent of post-use filings.
• New-member filings: Among 1,295 first-year filings from new members, approximately 69 percent were noncompliant.

These figures are likely to inform FINRA’s expectations regarding training, testing and supervisory evidence under any final rule.

The Practical Governance Question

For many firms, the practical question is not whether risk-based supervision is conceptually preferable. It is whether the firm possesses reliable data, communication inventories, surveillance tools and governance discipline to distinguish lower-risk from higher-risk communications without creating gaps. A universal pre-use approval system may be burdensome, but its control design is straightforward. A risk-based system can be more efficient, but only if the design is defensible and the operation is demonstrable.

Practical Considerations for Member Firms

• Do not change current procedures prematurely: Regulatory Notice 26-14 is a request for comment. Existing approval, filing, supervision and recordkeeping requirements remain in effect.
• Inventory communications: Identify the types of retail communications the firm produces, the products and services addressed, the personnel and vendors involved, the distribution channels, and current approval and filing requirements.
• Develop a preliminary risk taxonomy: Consider which categories would warrant mandatory pre-use review and which could be supervised through templates, automated controls, sampling, post-use review or surveillance.
• Evaluate evidence of implementation: Review whether the firm can demonstrate training completion, review decisions, surveillance results, escalation, corrective action and periodic testing.
• Assess AI governance: Document approved tools, use cases, validation, data controls, human oversight, monitoring, retention and exception handling. Prohibit unapproved tools where appropriate.
• Reassess social media and influencer arrangements: Review adoption and entanglement, compensation, disclosures, supervision, recordkeeping and the ability to terminate or remediate noncompliant content.
• Map dual-regulatory obligations: Dually registered firms should compare FINRA Rule 2210, the SEC Marketing Rule, Regulation Best Interest and applicable books-and-records requirements before attempting to consolidate workflows.
• Quantify implementation costs and benefits: FINRA specifically requests empirical information. Firms considering a comment letter should document staffing, technology, principal-review time, vendor costs and expected operational savings.
• Consider commenting: The proposal will affect firms differently. Comments can address risk factors, small-firm burdens, social media classifications, AI controls, filing categories, ephemeral system-generated communications and the interaction with investment-adviser standards.

Issues Firms May Wish to Address in Comment Letters

FINRA requests broad feedback, including on the following questions:

• Risk-based supervision: Whether the proposed risk-based framework adequately balances efficiency and investor protection.
• Minimum controls: Whether additional mandatory risk factors or minimum controls should apply.
• Social media risk: How firms should assess platform-specific and communication-specific social media risk.
• AI-assisted communications: How firms currently generate, supervise, review and approve AI-assisted communications and what human oversight is appropriate.
• Filing requirements: Whether additional products should be included in or excluded from filing requirements.
• Specific recommendations: Whether Rule 2210(d)(7) should be aligned with the investment-adviser standard for specific investment advice.
• Dually registered firms: What challenges dually registered firms face and where further harmonization would be appropriate.
• Ephemeral communications: How to supervise and retain ephemeral system-generated communications such as account balances, margin notices, order-status updates and customer-configured alerts.
• FINRA review process: Whether Advertising Regulation review letters and filing processes are sufficiently timely, accurate and useful.
• Economic impact: How economic impacts differ by firm size, business model, communication volume and technology capabilities.

Comment letters will be made publicly available. Firms should therefore coordinate legal, compliance, business, operations and government-relations review and avoid including confidential, proprietary or personally identifiable information that they do not wish to disclose publicly.

FINRA Rule 2210 Proposal FAQs

Has FINRA already eliminated principal pre-use approval for retail communications?

No. The notice is a proposal. Current Rule 2210 requirements remain effective until a final rule change is approved and becomes operative.

Would firms be required to adopt risk-based supervision?

The proposal would require written procedures identifying which retail communications require principal pre-use approval. A firm could continue requiring pre-use approval for all retail communications if it concludes that approach is appropriate for its business.

Would AI-generated communications be exempt from Rule 2210?

No. The firm remains responsible for the communication. AI changes the means of creation or review, not the applicable content or supervisory obligations.

Would social media receive less supervision?

Not necessarily. The static-interactive distinction would be removed, but firms would have to classify social media risk based on content, audience, distribution, preparer, endorsements, products and other factors.

Would the proposal change Regulation Best Interest?

No. Reg BI would continue to apply when a broker-dealer or associated person makes a recommendation of a securities transaction or investment strategy involving securities to a retail customer.

When are comments due?

Comments must be received by September 11, 2026. FINRA states that submitted comments generally will be posted publicly.

Conclusion: Why Broker-Dealers Should Prepare Now

A True Modernization Proposal

Regulatory Notice 26-14 is a genuine modernization proposal, not merely a technical cleanup. It would give broker-dealers more discretion to allocate supervisory resources according to communications risk and reduce several rule distinctions that have become difficult to apply to modern platforms and technologies. It also would move FINRA’s broker-dealer advertising framework closer to the SEC’s principles-based approach in selected areas.

Flexibility Does Not Reduce Accountability

That flexibility would not reduce substantive accountability. On the contrary, firms would bear greater responsibility for explaining why their supervisory framework is reasonable, proving that it operates as designed, and producing reliable evidence of training, surveillance, testing, escalation and corrective action.

High-Risk Communications Remain High-Risk

AI-generated content, influencer communications and post-use-filed advertisements would remain attributable to the member firm and subject to the same fair-and-balanced, non-misleading standards.

Use the Comment Period Strategically

Broker-dealers should use the comment period to evaluate how the proposal would function within their actual business model. Firms that expect efficiencies should identify them concretely. Firms that anticipate disproportionate costs, unclear risk classifications or operational difficulties should document those concerns and consider providing FINRA with focused, data-supported comments. In all events, current Rule 2210 procedures should remain in place unless and until a final rule becomes effective.

About Robert Moreiro

Robert Moreiro advises registered investment advisers, broker-dealers and associated persons on securities regulation, compliance and enforcement matters. With more than 20 years of experience, he counsels clients on SEC, FINRA and state registration issues, compliance policies, CCO responsibilities, regulatory examinations and investigations. Robert has served as an expert witness in FINRA arbitration, is recognized in the 2025 and 2026 editions of The Best Lawyers in America for Securities Regulation, and holds the Investment Adviser Certified Compliance Professional and Certified Securities Compliance Professional designations.