SEC grants CCUS clearing members relief on customer margin treatment

The Securities and Exchange Commission issued an order on Oct 23 2026 (Release No. 34-106726; File No. 4-930) granting conditional exemptive relief to broker-dealers that are clearing members of Cboe Clear U.S., LLC (CCUS). The relief removes the limitation in Item 13 and Note F of Exhibit A to Rule 15c3-3a that restricts the Item 13 debit to margin required and on deposit with the Options Clearing Corporation (OCC).

Under the order, margin required and on deposit with CCUS may be treated the same as OCC-held margin for the customer reserve computation and for the PAB reserve computation. This aligns the treatment of CCUS-held margin with that currently afforded to OCC clearing members.

The order follows CCUS's application filed Sep 18 2026, after the agency received temporary registration for a period of 18 months (see Release No. 34-106723, Oct 22 2026). The Commission published a notice of the application on Sep 29 2026 and received one comment, a letter from Shawn SN dated Oct 13 2026.

The Commission noted that the exemption is consistent with section 17A(a)(2) of the Exchange Act, which directs equal regulation of registered clearing agencies, and conditioned the relief on compliance with the terms set forth in the order.

Effective upon issuance, the order permits the affected clearing members to include CCUS-held margin in the Item 13 debit and Note F calculation, providing comparable reserve-requirement treatment across the two registered options clearing agencies.