The antitrust battle between CUSIP Global Services (CGS) and a York, Pennsylvania-based non-profit organization specializing in financing global infrastructure projects, over the U.S. numbering agency’s refusal to activate issued CUSIPs or assign new ones has heated up as additional plaintiffs sign onto the litigation bandwagon and more the details of CGS’ alleged wrongdoing emerge.
As reported by FinOps Report in April 2026, the Global Infrastructure Finance and Development Authority (GIFDA) in February accused CGS of violating the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890 by using its role as the U.S’ national securities identification agency in two ways. The first was to block competitors from entering the market for ID codes and the second was to refuse to activate or issue the GIFDA’s CUSIPs needed for it to sell municipal bonds in the public market. The GIFDA issues bonds on behalf of state political subdivisions and its infrastructure financing activities are authorized by the legislatures of Alabama, Georgia, and Pennsylvania.
Short for Committee on Uniform Securities Procedures, CUSIPs are nine-digit alphanumeric codes used to identify securities of trades executed on national exchanges and alternative platforms and of transactions processed through Depository Trust & Clearing Corp. (DTCC). That’s the umbrella organization for the U.S.’ national securities depository Depository Trust Company (DTC) and its sister clearinghouses. Rule G-34 of the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board (MSRB), the watchdog for the U.S. munibond market, requires municipal bonds to use CUSIPs if sold in the public market, but not in private placements. Those are direct sales to a limited number of sophisticated investors without a middleman underwriter.
CGS is operated by FactSet Research under contract to the American Bankers Association (ABA), the influential Washington,D.C.-based bank trade association which launched the CGS in 1968 and reportedly keeps 30 percent of CGS’ annual revenues. FactSet is a co-defendant in the GIFDA’s lawsuit. CGS earns its revenues by assigning CUSIPs to issuers and by charging financial firms and other users annual licensing fees for access and distribution. Since FactSet never breaks out CGS’ financials it is impossible to know just how lucrative the U.S securities identification business is for itself and the ABA. FactSet purchased CGS from S&P Global in January 2022 for US$1.9 billion after the European Commission (EC) ordered S&P to divest CGS as a condition of allowing its merger with IHS Markit.
In its first amended complaint against CGS filed in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania in April 2026, the GIFDA and its new co-defendants reiterated the GIFDA’s previous allegation made in February that CGS was initially happy to assign three CUSIPs, but ultimately did not activate them so they could not be used. CGS then declined to issue a fourth one on the grounds that private placements do not receive CUSIPs even though CGS has issued ID codes to plenty of other similar municipal bonds. “The defendants’ conduct satisfies the elements of unlawful monopolization, refusal to deal and denial of access to a central facility,” wrote the Cheyenne, Wyoming-based law firm of XBT LLC representing the plaintiffs in their filing with the Pennsylvania court in April. The court document detailed how each plaintiff in the case was damaged by CGS’ alleged bad conduct. In addition to the GIFDA, the plaintiffs now include Ameri Metro, Malibu Homes, Atlantic Energy Project Utility, HSR Freight Line, and HSR Technologies. CGS’ motion to dismiss the case based on GIFDA’s filing in February was declared moot, or denied, because the GIFDA filed an amended complaint. CGS had not responded to the complaint as FinOps Report went to press and the next court date has yet to be set. The GIFDA and CGS declined to comment for this article.
The lawsuit involving GIFDA and others is one of two CGS faces with its parent FactSet. As reported by FinOps Report, the other is a class-action lawsuit filed by Dinosaur Financial Group, Hildene Capital and Swiss Life Management in March 2022, also alleging CGS violated the U.S, antitrust law through a different means — by charging excessive licensing fees and restricting distribution. CGS requires financial firms receiving CUSIPs through data vendors to sign separate licensing agreements with CGS and to agree to be audited to ensure they meet the rigid terms of their contracts. The CGS’ restrictions prohibit financial firms from using CUSIPs they received from data vendors in any way not specified by CGS. The plaintiffs argued that CGS’ high licensing fees are an abuse of its monopoly power. In addition, any restriction on distribution of CUSIPs is invalid because the ABA’s claim that it owns the copywright to the CUSIP system is bogus. That lawsuit, which includes CGS’ former parent S&P Global, and the ABA as defendants, is pending in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York where the plaintiffs are trying to win the judge’s certification of a class of affected clients. Dinosaur Financial, Hildene Capital, and Swiss Life Management estimated that CGS and its co-defendants, could pay all of CGS’ eligible clients combined a total of over USD$1 billion in damages based on their licensing contracts signed beginning in 2018.
The GIFDA is the first issuer to sue CGS and should it win its case at the very least CGS would have to assign GIFDA all of its twelve requested CUSIPs. FactSet would also likely be compelled to force CGS to change or at least clarify its policies for when it issues CUSIPs or denies a request for a CUSIP. A GIFDA win could also impact the class-action case against CGS by bolstering the plaintiffs’ claims that CGS used its monopoly power to control access to a critical market infrastructure. However, Dinosaur Financial, Hildene Capital, and Swiss Life Management would still have to prove their case against CGS and the class-wide harm.
Issuers assume that CGS will grant them CUSIPs as long as they complete the necessary documentation and they will be given a chance to make any required adjustments. None of the dozen Wall Street data management experts who spoke with FinOps Report under the condition of anonymity were aware of any other issuer being denied a CUSIP. Therefore, it stands to reason that GIFDA’s legal strategy will focus on how CGS discriminated against the GIFDA by using different standards for issuing and activating its CUSIPs from those of its peers. As evidence of such exclusionary tactics, in their first amended complaint the GIFDA and other plaintiffs noted that in November 2025 alone CGS processed 1,191 requests for municipal bond CUSIPs. Of those, 82 requests were fulfilled for issuers in the three states whose legislatures have authorized the GIFDA’s projects, Of the 82, nine were for issuers in Alabama, 17 for Georgia and 56 for Pennsylvania.
Harm Done
Naturally, GIFDA and the other plaintiffs are also hoping for a financial windfall based on their losses and reputational damage. By denying CUSIPs, the CGS, the GIFDA and other plaintiffs alleged, blocked over USD$219 billion in authorized bond financing across five project entities, triggered the SEC’s revocation of a 13-year public company’s registration, sank two sovereign-linked asset acquisitions in Nigeria and Morocco, stalled the Appalachian Regional Corridor freight rail project and prevented the construction of a patented trade manufacturing facility in York, Pennsylvania. Among the plaintiffs, Ameri Metro was the most harmed after CGS allegedly withdrew its CUSIPs without advance notice and without any reasonable explanation. As a result, on January 17, 2025 the SEC revoked the registration of each class of Ameri Metro’s securities and because Ameri Metro could not access the capital market for so long its ability to remain operational is now at risk. Ameri Metro is described as the “horizontal and vertical site improvements developer” in each master trust indenture issued by GIFDA including indentures related to HSR Technologies, HSR Freight Lines, HSR Passenger Services, and Malibu Homes. A master trust indenture allows multiple series of bonds to be issued using the same contract between a bond issuer and a trustee.
It is unclear just what caused CGS and the GIFDA’s tumultuous relationship which ended in a nasty court battle. If one were to believe the GIFDA’s account, CGS provided a multitude of muddled explanations for why it would not activate the GIFDA’s three CUSIPs and why it refused to issue a fourth one. The GIFDA claimed that CGS’ rationale didn’t make sense and it even contradicted its public stance. In a December 2020 promotional video released by CGS, Gerard Faulkner, CGS’ director of data operations, said he welcomed the expansion of CUSIPs into new asset types. However, according to the GIFDA, his public statement differed from his firm’s poor private treatment of the plaintiffs seeking CUSIPs for state-authorized infrastructure bonds. Therefore, Faulkner’s refusal to provide the GIFDA with a CUSIP is “pretextual and discriminatory,” wrote XBT LLC in the GIFDA’s first amended complaint against CGS and FactSet.
Just one example of CGS’ alleged bad conduct highlighted by the GIFDA and other plaintiffs was its reversal of a CUSIP assigned in August 2022 to GIFDA’s Revenue Bond Series 2022-2 relating to Atlantic Energy. In another instance in August 2022, CGS assigned a CUSIP to GIFDA’s Revenue Bond Series 2022 relating to Malibu Homes to also subsequently reverse it without sufficient notice or the ability to correct any shortcoming. When GIFDA obtained a replacement ISIN for its bonds from the London-headquartered firm ISIN.org, whose website indicates it is not a national securities identification agency, rather a facilitator and information database. (ISIN.org could not be reached for comment as its automated telephone system in New York and London directs callers to direct any inquiries on ISINs through its website). The 12 digit alphanumeric ISINs for U.S. securities are an extension of CUSIPs in that they simply add the symbol US as a prefix and a check digit at the end. CGS would not sign an agreement with the GIFDA to refrain from interfering with that ISIN for Malibu Homes, a stance the GIFDA interpreted as a “concrete and present threat.” Despite GIFDA’s efforts, without a CUSIP Malibu Homes could not issue USD$60 billion in revenue bonds to finance residential and commercial development projects in California and Pennsylvania.
CGS’ Side
In April 2026 when responding to the GIFDA’s initial court filing in February, CGS presented some inkling of its legal strategy. Rather than directly addressing its policies for issuing or denying a CUSIP, CGS alleged that the GIFDA improperly tried to turn a dispute over CUSIP access into an antitrust violation. The GIFDA didn’t meet the litmus test required to prove CGS violated the Sherman Antitrust Act, because the test does not include refusing to do business with a customer. CGS insisted it had the right to deny the GIFDA a CUSIP. “The antitrust laws impose no requirement that CGS issue CUSIPs to GIFDA at GIFDA’s request,” wrote the law firm of Shinder Cantor Lerner representing CGS and FactSet in their motion to dismiss the GIFDA’s lawsuit. “As a general rule, businesses are free to choose the parties with which they will deal.”
However, in its first amended complaint, the GIFDA and other plaintiffs disputed CGS’ interpretation of U.S. antitust laws. They argued that CGS’ boilerplate language in its contracts, which gives the company the sole discretion to approve or deny issuing a CUSIP, does not allow CGS to violate the Sherman Antitrust Act. “The antitrust laws embody public policy that overrides private contractual terms,” asserted XBT LLC. The CGS in its court filing, it noted, had a good faith obligation to process applications it voluntarily accepted and acted upon for nearly four years.
In its initial motion to dismiss the case, CGS also said that the GIFDA did not meet another factor for proving the numbering agency vioated US antitrust regulations. The GIFDA offered no proof that CGS’ denial of a CUSIP impacted prices, quantity, or quality in the alleged relevant market which is the market for securities identifiers. A high market share alone would not be enough for CGS to be considered a monopoly, according to CGS. Instead, a “barrier to entry'” would be required. By CGS’ interpretation, the GIFDA’s references to obstacles are invalid, because the GIFDA acknowledged that competitors have entered the securities identification arena.
There is no doubt that the CGS’ main rival is Bloomberg, which assigns Financial Instrument Global Identifiers (FIGIs)– 12-digit alphaumeric codes. Unlike CGS, Bloomberg does not charge issuers fees to provide FIGIs nor financial firms to access them although many users of FIGIs typically pay for Bloomberg’s terminals or applications which include the ID codes. However, despite their growing popularity, FIGIs don’t carry the same clout as CUSIPs because they cannot be used to process securities transactions at DTCC. Financial firms must still rely on CUSIPs and pay CGS’ licensing fees. What’s more, the ABA has an exclusive relationship with CGS to issue ID codes for U.S. securities. Therefore, CUSIPs remain the industry standard by a longshot and there is no evidence that status will change.
FInOps Report has received numerous emails and calls over the past week seeking its editor’s opinion as to how CGS will fare in the litigation. While it would be inappropriate to speculate on an outome, it would be fair to say that the GIFDA’s decision to add plaintiffs, more details about what transpired between the plaintiffs and defendants, and its analysis of the financial harm to each plaintiff, will bolster its chance for success. However, even if a judge were to force CGS to issue and activate all of the GIFDA’s requested CUSIPs, the non-profit and other plaintiffs won’t have an easy time winning their larger antitrust charge because of the high burden of proof. They will have to show that CGS had a legal obligation to provide their CUSIPs and no legitimate reason to deny them, said legal experts unrelated to the case who spoke with FinOps Report on condition of anonymity.
Chris Kentouris
KentourisC@gmail.com
917.520.3226
Alabama# ABA# AmericanBankersAssociation #AmeriMetro# Antitrust# Bloomberg# ClassAction# CUSIP# CusipGlobalServices# Data# DataManagement# DataVendors #DinosaurFinancialGroup# EuropeanCommission# FactsetResearch# FIGIs# FinancialInstrumentGlobalIdentifiers# FinOps# Georgia# HildeneCapital# Lawsuit# Litigation# Monopoly# MSRB# MunicipalSecuritiesRulemakingBoard# Munibond# Operations# Pennsylvania# Post-Trade# PrivatePlacement# SEC# SecuritiesandExchangeCommission# SecuritiesFraud# ShermanAntitrustAct# ShinderCantorLerner# SwissLife# Wyoming# XBTLLC#
Leave a Comment
You must be logged in to post a comment.