Mindful of the seriousness of suspensions, the SEC moves as quickly as possible when it considers a trading suspension. The SEC will not comment publicly on the status of a company when the ten-day suspension ends because the company may still have serious legal problems. For instance, the SEC may continue to investigate a company to determine whether it has defrauded investors. The public will not know if the SEC is continuing its investigation until the SEC publicly announces an enforcement action against the company. It depends on the market where the stock trades.
Different rules apply in different markets.
Before trading can resume for OTC stocks, SEC regulations require a broker-dealer to review information about a company before publishing a quote. In contrast to OTC stocks, stocks that trade on an exchange or Nasdaq resume trading as soon as an SEC suspension ends. The trading suspension may raise serious questions and cast doubts about the company in the minds of investors. While some investors may be willing to buy the company's stock, they will do so only at significantly lower prices. Because a suspension often causes a dramatic decline in the price of the security, the SEC suspends trading only when it believes the public may be making investment decisions based on false or misleading information.