FINRA Arbitration Analysis
Simplified Arbitration is FINRA's expedited process for customer claims of $50,000 or less. Cases are decided by a single arbitrator, typically on written submissions without a hearing. Cases are identified from award document text referencing Rule 12800 or "simplified arbitration." Pre-2020 case counts are lower due to inconsistent labeling in older documents.
All statistics are derived from automated text extraction of FINRA arbitration award PDFs. No consistent formatting standard exists across these documents — outcomes, dollar amounts, and case classifications are identified through pattern matching against raw text. Results may be incomplete or miscategorized where award language is non-standard, ambiguous, or where OCR quality is poor (common in pre-2013 scanned documents). Treat all figures as directionally informative, not authoritative.