Credit Suisse to buy back $79M in auction-rate securities

Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC has agreed to buy back $79 million of auction rate securities from Colorado investors who struggled to sell them after the market for them froze.

State regulators said the agreement announced Tuesday is part of a multistate settlement in which Credit Suisse agreed to buy back or resolve more than $3.5 billion of auction rate securities from customers.

It settles claims by regulators who alleged customers weren’t always told the risks of those investments, whose interest rates are reset at regular auctions, sometimes as often as weekly.

Regulators allege many firms marketed them as safe, cash-like investments, but when the market froze in 2008, investors found they couldn’t readily be sold for cash.