Communication Categories
Chapters in this video
- 0:00 The three buckets and why classification matters
- 1:41 Who counts as an institutional investor
- 2:32 Internal communications are not correspondence
- 3:09 The "institutional only" label trap
- 4:08 The 25-person threshold and rolling 30-day window
- 5:40 Public appearances and the unscripted requirement
- 7:01 The three-step decision tree for exam day
- 8:20 Rapid-fire exam recap
What this video covers
- The three communication categories and how audience size and type determine whether a piece is retail communication, institutional communication, or correspondence
- The institutional-investor definition, including the $50 million total-assets threshold that turns even a wealthy individual into an institutional recipient
- Why internal communications are not correspondence and where the exam hides that carve-out in the rule text
- The rolling 30-calendar-day trap that converts 26 individual emails into a retail communication, even when sent one at a time
- Why labeling a document "institutional use only" fails if the firm has reason to believe it will reach a retail investor
- The public-appearance definition and why unscripted speaking matters, plus when scripted material reverts to retail communication
- The three-step decision tree to classify any communication on exam day without guessing
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