Florida Extends Securities Dormancy to 10 Years as States Broaden 3-Year Seizure Rules
Updated
Updated · Fox News · Aug 12
Florida Extends Securities Dormancy to 10 Years as States Broaden 3-Year Seizure Rules
1 articles · Updated · Fox News · Aug 12
Summary
Florida's 2026 overhaul lengthens the owner-inactivity period for some securities from 3 years to 10 and restores returned mail or failed electronic contact as a key abandonment trigger.
More than half of states now treat securities as abandoned after 3 years, down from the 7-year norm, while shifting from a "lost" standard to simple inactivity even when dividends still arrive.
That change can be costly: California sold former Amazon employee Jan Peters' 1,029 pre-split shares for about $1.6 million; he said they would have been worth more than $4.2 million by June 2025.
States have clear fiscal incentives to shorten dormancy periods—Texas projected a one-time $72 million gain in 2011, and New Jersey once estimated revenue could jump from about $90 million to $309 million.
The pipeline is large and error-prone: Computershare remitted 51,320 lost-securityholder accounts in 2024, and Sen. Elizabeth Warren in April asked state administrators to explain the shift toward shorter, inactivity-based rules.