The Form F-6 Files dataset is a per-accession archive of every Form F-6 and Form F-6/A registration statement submitted to EDGAR from February 1999 to the present. Form F-6 is the Securities Act of 1933 registration statement prescribed under 17 CFR 239.36 for depositary shares evidenced by American Depositary Receipts (ADRs); the filer is always a depositary bank — the Bank of New York Mellon, Citibank, JPMorgan, Deutsche Bank, and similar institutions — registering an ADR program backed by the securities of a foreign issuer. Each record corresponds to one EDGAR accession and bundles a structured metadata.json digest with the F-6 primary document and its exhibits (the deposit agreement, the legal opinion, and where applicable a Rule 466 certification) as filed, excluding referenced image assets. Records are grouped into monthly ZIP containers and cover both originals (F-6) and amendments (F-6/A).
Programmatically retrieve the full list of dataset archive files, download URLs and dataset metadata.
Dataset Index JSON API
Download the entire dataset as a single archive file.
Download Entire Dataset:
Download a single container file (e.g. monthly archive) from the dataset.
Download Single Container:
A single record in the Form F-6 Files dataset is one Form F-6 or Form F-6/A registration statement, identified by its EDGAR accession number and materialised on disk as a per-accession folder. Each folder bundles a metadata.json digest with the full set of documents that constituted the original EDGAR submission — the Form F-6 cover document and its attached exhibits — minus referenced image assets. The folder name is the canonical SEC accession with hyphens stripped and zero-padded to eighteen digits. Per-accession folders are grouped under monthly ZIP containers partitioned by year, and those ZIPs are the delivery unit of the dataset.
A record is therefore simultaneously an artifact (a folder of HTM/HTML, occasional PDF, and JSON files keyed by accession) and a legal instrument (one Securities Act registration statement for a specific American Depositary Receipt program). Every field in metadata.json and every attached document belongs to exactly one accession. Amendments (F-6/A) are filed under their own accession numbers and appear as separate records rather than overwriting the original F-6.
Form F-6 has been a stable instrument since its current codification at 17 CFR 239.36 was adopted, and the dataset's earliest records (February 1999) already exhibit the F-6 / EX-1 / EX-4 architecture present today. The file types found in the dataset are HTM/HTML for the great majority of documents, occasional PDF for specific exhibits, JSON for the per-accession metadata, and TXT references for the complete-submission wrapper. Filenames typically follow a depositary-specific deterministic slug pattern (issuer-name slug + role suffix f6 / receipt / opinion / 466), making the role of each file recognisable from the filename alone in addition to the SGML <TYPE> header.
Form F-6 is the Securities Act of 1933 registration statement prescribed under 17 CFR 239.36 for depositary shares evidenced by American Depositary Receipts. It is filed not by the foreign operating company whose securities back the program but by the depositary bank that issues the ADRs. The depositary registers a specified maximum number of American Depositary Shares to be issued against deposits of a foreign issuer's securities; the registration covers the ADSs themselves, not the underlying foreign equity, which is registered (or exempt) separately.
This bipartite structure — depositary as legal filer, foreign issuer as the subject of the deposit — is reflected in every F-6 record. The disclosure obligations of Form F-6 are correspondingly narrow: rather than the operational, financial, and risk disclosures of issuer-driven Securities Act forms, an F-6 documents the mechanics of the ADR program, the contractual rights of holders, the fees the depositary will levy, and the depositary's eligibility to use Form F-6 (which requires the underlying foreign issuer to be an Exchange Act reporting company or to qualify for the Rule 12g3-2(b) exemption). Form F-6/A is the amendment vehicle for a previously filed F-6, used to correct, supplement, or restate the original — most commonly to update the maximum number of ADSs registered, the share-to-ADS ratio, or the deposit agreement terms.
A record assembles three concentric layers around the underlying F-6 submission:
metadata.json, the structured digest of the EDGAR submission header — form type, accession, filing timestamp, effectiveness date when assigned, EDGAR description, document inventory, entity blocks, and link references back to the SEC archive..htm file (occasionally .pdf) that retains the EDGAR SGML document wrapper at the top, so the on-disk file is technically an SGML envelope around an HTML body rather than pure HTML.A consumer reading only metadata.json can reconstruct the accession's identity, parties, filing chronology, and document manifest. A consumer reading the document files reads the legal substance — the registration statement cover, the ADR Form of Receipt with the Statement of Terms and Conditions, the legal opinion, and where present the Rule 466 certification.
The F-6 document (SGML <TYPE>F-6, sequence 1, typically named <issuerslug>f6.htm) is the registration statement cover. It carries:
Despite the laconic SGML labels (<TYPE>EX-1, <DESCRIPTION>FORM OF RECEIPT), this exhibit is the substantive ADR contract and the largest document in the filing by a wide margin. It opens with a stylised receipt face — the heading "AMERICAN DEPOSITARY SHARES", the depositary's name (e.g., "THE BANK OF NEW YORK MELLON"), the ADS-to-underlying-share ratio, and the foreign issuer's name and place of incorporation — and continues into the Statement of Terms and Conditions that operates as the deposit agreement. The Terms and Conditions cover:
The Form of Receipt thus carries the bulk of the disclosure that ADR holders are entitled to read and is the primary contractual instrument governing the program.
The EX-4 exhibit is a short letter from the depositary's counsel (commonly a New York firm) opining that the ADSs, when issued in accordance with the Statement of Terms and Conditions, will be legally issued and will entitle holders to the rights specified in those terms. The exhibit is dated, addressed to the depositary, signed by the firm, and is typically two to three pages of HTML.
When the depositary is invoking Rule 466 immediate effectiveness, the filing includes an additional exhibit, SGML <TYPE>EX-5, captioned "Certification under Rule 466". The certificate states that the depositary previously had a Form F-6 declared effective by the Commission, identifies the prior reference filing by registrant name and registration (file number), and certifies that the terms of deposit of the present registration statement are identical to those of the prior effective F-6 except for the number of foreign securities each Depositary Share represents. The Rule 466 certification is what allows the new F-6 to become effective immediately upon filing rather than awaiting Staff review. The chaining is observable in practice: a depositary's later F-6 for one foreign issuer can cite its earlier F-6 for a different foreign issuer (file number 333-NNNNNN) as the prior effective Rule 466 reference, and the dataset's monthly partitioning frequently makes both ends of the chain retrievable from the same time window.
Each EDGAR submission also has a single .txt "Complete submission text file" — the SGML wrapper that EDGAR distributes containing every document concatenated. This file is referenced by metadata.json (as linkToTxt and as a synthetic blank-typed entry in documentFormatFiles[]), but its bytes are not extracted to disk; only the per-document .htm/.pdf files are present locally.
Every document file in a record retains the EDGAR SGML document header. The first lines of each .htm follow the pattern:
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<DOCUMENT>
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<TYPE>F-6
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<SEQUENCE>1
4
<FILENAME>gibsonenergyincf6.htm
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<DESCRIPTION>F-6
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<TEXT>
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<HTML>
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... HTML body ...
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</HTML>
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</TEXT>
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</DOCUMENT>
The five header lines (<TYPE>, <SEQUENCE>, <FILENAME>, <DESCRIPTION>, <TEXT>) precede the HTML body and exactly mirror the corresponding entry in metadata.json's documentFormatFiles[] array. Pipelines that need clean HTML must strip the SGML wrapper top-and-tail (<DOCUMENT>...<TEXT> prefix and </TEXT></DOCUMENT> suffix) before handing the body to an HTML parser. The <TYPE> value carries the canonical EDGAR document-type token (F-6, EX-1, EX-4, EX-5) and is the most reliable component-level discriminator within a record.
metadata.json is the structured digest of the EDGAR submission header for the accession. Its top-level fields include:
formType — F-6 for originals, F-6/A for amendments.accessionNo — the canonical SEC accession in NNNNNNNNNN-YY-NNNNNN form; matches the parent folder name once hyphens are stripped.filedAt — ISO 8601 timestamp with timezone, the moment EDGAR accepted the submission.effectivenessDate — the date EDGAR records the registration as effective. Present for filings that have actually gone effective (notably Rule 466 immediate-effectiveness filings, where the field is populated quickly), absent otherwise.description — EDGAR's human-readable description string, e.g., "Form F-6 — Registration of American Depository Receipt shares, not immediately effective" or the immediately-effective variant.linkToFilingDetails — URL of the primary F-6 HTML document on EDGAR.linkToTxt — URL of the complete submission .txt SGML file.linkToHtml — URL of the EDGAR *-index.htm filing-index page.linkToXbrl — empty string for F-6 filings.id — a 32-character hex identifier assigned by the dataset publisher.seriesAndClassesContractsInformation — empty for F-6 records (the field exists for fund-style filings).dataFiles — empty for F-6 records.documentFormatFiles[] — one entry per filed document, with sequence, size, documentUrl, description, and type. The order matches the <SEQUENCE> value in each document's SGML header. A synthetic blank-typed entry with description: "Complete submission text file" points at the wrapper .txt.entities[] — at minimum two entity blocks describing the parties to the filing (see below).Every F-6 record carries (at least) two entity blocks in entities[]: a Filer (the depositary) and a Subject (the foreign issuer whose securities back the ADR program). Both blocks share the keys cik, companyName, irsNo, stateOfIncorporation, and type. The role is encoded into the companyName string itself by a parenthetical suffix — "(Filed by)" for the depositary, "(Subject)" for the foreign issuer — which is a more reliable role discriminator than positional ordering. Additional fields differentiate the two:
sic value, typically "8880 American Depositary Receipts". Common depositary CIKs include the Bank of New York Mellon ADR Division (CIK 1201935); Citibank, Deutsche Bank, and JPMorgan ADR groups appear with their own CIKs in other records.act ("33", the Securities Act of 1933), fileNo (the EDGAR file number assigned to the F-6, e.g., 333-NNNNNN — the public registration number for the ADR program and the key that links amendments and Rule 466 chained filings), filmNo (SEC film number), and fiscalYearEnd (encoded as MMDD).The Subject's stateOfIncorporation uses SEC's two-character country/state code (e.g., A0 Alberta, A1 Ontario, X0-class non-U.S. country codes), not ISO codes. Some filings list more than two entities — for example when multiple depositaries co-file or when intermediate entities are involved — and the (Filed by) / (Subject) suffix convention scales to those cases.
A record includes the structured metadata.json digest, the F-6 primary document, and all attached exhibits as filed: EX-1 Form of Receipt and Statement of Terms and Conditions, EX-4 Opinion of Counsel, and EX-5 Rule 466 Certification when applicable.
.txt SGML wrapper. Referenced via linkToTxt and listed as a synthetic entry in documentFormatFiles[], but not extracted to disk; only the individual document files are present.The principal structural variations visible across the dataset are:
metadata.json shape, with formType: "F-6/A". They reference the prior original F-6 via the same Subject fileNo, so an amendment can be linked to its parent registration through the file number. Amendments may be filed pre-effectiveness (to respond to Staff comments) or post-effectiveness (to register additional ADSs, modify the deposit agreement, or update the depositary's representations); the dataset captures both as discrete records.Form F-6 filings have always been filed in narrative document form rather than as structured data. The format evolution is the standard EDGAR document-format progression from plain ASCII/text submissions in the late 1990s and early 2000s to HTML thereafter, with PDF used occasionally for specific exhibits. Across the full February 1999 to present coverage, every document is wrapped in the EDGAR SGML <DOCUMENT> envelope exposing <TYPE>, <SEQUENCE>, <FILENAME>, and <DESCRIPTION> headers; this wrapper convention is unchanged and is what permits consistent component identification regardless of whether the underlying body is ASCII text, HTML, or PDF.
entities[] is best determined by the "(Filed by)" / "(Subject)" suffix in companyName and by the presence of the sic field on the depositary, rather than by array position.fileNo is the durable public identifier of the ADR program and the join key for connecting originals to their F-6/A amendments and for resolving the prior-filing reference inside a Rule 466 EX-5 certification.effectivenessDate is informative when present (notably for Rule 466 filings, where it is populated quickly) but its absence does not imply non-effectiveness — only that EDGAR has not yet recorded an effectiveness date at extract time..htm file is wrapped in EDGAR SGML and must have the <DOCUMENT>...<TEXT> prefix and </TEXT></DOCUMENT> suffix stripped before HTML parsing. The SGML <TYPE> token is the most reliable per-document classifier; filename slugs are conventional but depositary-specific.Each record in this dataset is a Form F-6 registration statement or Form F-6/A amendment filed on EDGAR for an American Depositary Receipt program. The filer is always the depositary bank that issues the ADRs — never the foreign company whose ordinary shares back the program. On the cover page, the depositary is the registrant; the foreign company is listed as the "Subject Company" (issuer of the deposited securities). Searches by registrant CIK return the depositary's filings; locating filings tied to a particular foreign company requires querying the subject-company field.
ADRs (technically American Depositary Shares evidenced by ADR certificates) are themselves "securities" under Section 2(a)(1) of the Securities Act, distinct from the underlying foreign shares. Their public offering in the U.S. must be registered separately, and the depositary — as the legal issuer of the ADRs — carries the registration obligation.
In practice, almost all filings come from a small set of depositary institutions:
Form F-6 is prescribed by 17 CFR 239.36 under the Securities Act of 1933. It registers only the depositary shares evidenced by ADRs. Eligibility requires that:
These eligibility conditions attach to the foreign issuer but gate the depositary's ability to use Form F-6.
Rule 466 (17 CFR 230.466) allows Form F-6 registration statements and amendments to become effective immediately on filing where the depositary has previously filed the required authorization with the Commission and the rule's conditions are met. As a result, Form F-6 functions as a notice-style registration; effectiveness typically tracks filing without staff review. Filings that do not invoke Rule 466 become effective under ordinary Section 8(a) timing.
Form F-6 is event-driven, not periodic. Filings are made when:
Form F-6/A is filed to amend a previously filed F-6. Typical triggers:
Amendments commonly qualify for Rule 466 immediate effectiveness on the same terms as the original filing.
Form F-6 is a transactional, one-time registration, not a periodic report. There is no annual or quarterly F-6 obligation. The flow of new records reflects:
Because the major depositaries each maintain hundreds of programs, the aggregate filing flow is steady even though any single program files rarely.
Form F-6 registers the depositary receipts themselves under the Securities Act, not the foreign equity they represent and not the foreign issuer's ongoing reporting obligations. Because a single ADR program typically generates filings across several other form families, F-6 is easily confused with foreign private issuer (FPI) registration forms, FPI periodic reports, and Exchange Act class registrations. The comparisons below mark the boundaries.
F-6EF is an effectiveness pathway, not a separate form. Under Rule 466, a depositary with a previously effective F-6 may file a new registration that becomes effective on filing, skipping staff review. Substantive content matches a standard F-6: deposit agreement, ADR description, fee schedule, issuer eligibility statement. This dataset captures F-6 and F-6/A only; the Rule 466 path is out of scope, so a complete program history may require pulling F-6EF separately.
F-6/A is a pre- or post-effective amendment used to register additional ADRs, modify the deposit agreement, change fees, or update issuer eligibility. It is included here and should be read alongside the underlying F-6 to recover the operative program terms; treated alone, it omits the baseline deposit agreement.
F-1 is the long-form Securities Act registration filed by the foreign issuer for its own equity or debt: business description, audited financials, risk factors, MD&A, use of proceeds, underwriter information. F-6 carries none of that — the foreign issuer is not even the registrant. F-1 covers the underlying shares; F-6 covers the receipt wrapper. F-1 for fundamentals; F-6 for ADR mechanics, fees, and holder rights.
F-3 is the seasoned-issuer short form, incorporating by reference from 20-F and 6-K. Like F-1, it registers the foreign issuer's own securities, not the receipts. F-3 and F-6 are often filed close together when an FPI launches or expands a US ADR offering, and a full capital-raising picture needs both — but they are not substitutes.
F-4 registers securities issued in mergers, exchange offers, and other FPI business combinations, with deal-specific disclosure: fairness opinions, pro forma financials, transaction background. When the consideration includes ADRs, an F-6 may also be filed or amended to cover the receipts. F-4 is the substantive deal document; F-6 is the mechanical registration of the receipt instrument.
20-F is the FPI analogue of the Form 10-K — recurring issuer-level Exchange Act disclosure with audited financials, business description, risk factors, and governance. Filed by the issuer, not the depositary; carries no deposit agreement or fee detail. F-6 is a one-time (plus amendments) registration of the ADR instrument; 20-F is the ongoing issuer record. Complementary, not substitutable.
Form 6-K furnishes material information FPIs publicly disclose in their home jurisdiction — earnings releases, board changes, dividend announcements. Issuer-filed and event-driven. No content overlap with F-6: 6-K never describes the deposit agreement. F-6 sets the static legal framework of the program; 6-K provides the running flow of issuer news on which ADR holders rely.
Form S-8 is occasionally grouped with F-6 as a "narrow" Securities Act registration, but the resemblance is cosmetic. S-8 registers securities offered to employees of domestic issuers under benefit plans, incorporating by reference from the issuer's reports. Different filer population, different transaction, different instrument. Listed only to dispel the confusion.
When an ADR program is listed on a US exchange or otherwise becomes Section 12 registered, an 8-A12B (exchange-listed) or 8-A12G (Section 12(g)) is filed in addition to the F-6. 8-A registers the class of securities under the Exchange Act and triggers ongoing reporting; F-6 registers the offer and sale of the receipts under the Securities Act. Both can coexist for the same program. Use 8-A to date public tradability on a US exchange; use F-6 for the legal terms of the receipts themselves.
The defining axis of this dataset is depositary-versus-issuer. F-6 is filed by the depositary bank for an ADR program; the foreign issuer is named but is not the registrant. F-6 is therefore the only SEC filing that systematically captures the contractual mechanics of ADR programs — deposit agreement, issuance/cancellation/dividend fee schedule, voting and information pass-through, issuer-eligibility and sponsored-versus-unsponsored status. No issuer-filed FPI form (F-1, F-3, F-4, 20-F, 6-K) contains this material at comparable detail; they describe the underlying equity and the issuer's business. F-6 describes the receipt wrapper sitting between the foreign share and the US holder. A complete view of a US-listed ADR generally combines F-6 (receipt terms), Form 8-A (Exchange Act class registration), and the issuer's 20-F and 6-K stream (ongoing disclosure). For ADR program structure, depositary fee economics, sponsored versus unsponsored designations, deposit agreement evolution, and the universe of ADR registrations and their amendment histories, this dataset is not interchangeable with any other.
Form F-6 filings register ADRs issued by depositary banks against deposited foreign securities. The dataset serves a narrow set of professionals who each read different exhibits and metadata fields.
Sales-traders and ADR specialists confirm that a US-listed receipt sits behind an active F-6, identify the depositary on conversion and cancellation flows, and read the ADR-to-ordinary ratio before quoting prices. They pull the ratio and registered ADR count from EX-1 (deposit agreement) and the cover page, and use metadata.json for the depositary CIK, subject foreign issuer, and file number. F-6/A amendments flag ratio changes or expanded registered amounts.
ADR product, structuring, and operations groups maintain authoritative records of every program they administer or compete against. Product managers compare EX-1 fee schedules clause by clause, benchmarking issuance, cancellation, dividend pass-through, custody, and pre-release terms. Operations teams use the entities array to confirm filer-versus-subject pairing and EX-4 (opinion of counsel) for legal validity coverage. F-6/A filings surface competitor fee revisions and program migrations.
Sell-side analysts and buy-side PMs determine whether a covered foreign issuer has a US ADR vehicle, the conversion ratio, and the holder-level frictions versus the local line. They focus on EX-1 voting pass-through and fee mechanics, and the eligibility section indicating whether the issuer is 12g3-2(b)-exempt or a full Exchange Act reporter. Output supports ADR-versus-ordinary recommendations and mandates restricted to SEC-registered instruments.
Asset servicing and corporate-actions teams interpret ADR-specific events: cash and stock dividends, ratio changes, mandatory and voluntary conversions, rights distributions, and deposit/withdrawal mechanics. They rely on EX-1 for fee-charging authority and record dates, plus F-6/A amendments that modify these mechanics. The data feeds ADR event templates used to scrub vendor corporate-actions feeds and reconcile ADR-versus-underlying breaks.
Capital markets counsel advising foreign private issuers, depositaries, and underwriters use the dataset as a precedent library. They benchmark voting, indemnification, force majeure, sanctions/FATCA, pre-release, termination, and liability provisions across EX-1 deposit agreements, read EX-4 opinions on the legality of the registered depositary shares, EX-5 Rule 466 certifications where present, and the cover-page mechanics under 17 CFR 239.36. Output supports new deposit agreement drafts, side-by-side redlines, and disclosure checks ahead of F-6 or F-6/A filing.
Withholding agents and operational tax teams trace how distributions flow through the depositary, how ADR fees interact with home-country withholding, and how FATCA and treaty-relief duties split between depositary and holder. They focus on EX-1 fee and distribution mechanics and tax-related representations. The data supports withholding workflows, treaty-relief documentation, and 1099/1042-S reporting logic.
Onboarding and surveillance teams verify that an ADR is registered under an active F-6 before admitting it to a venue, retail platform, or fund. They use metadata.json accession numbers, file numbers, filing dates, and the depositary/subject CIK pairing, and check F-6/A amendments to confirm registered share counts have not been exceeded. Output drives security-master eligibility flags and restricted-list audit trails.
Methodology teams and security-master vendors construct reference data on every sponsored ADR program. They pair filer and subject CIKs from the entities array, capture registered share counts and ratios from the cover and EX-1, and track program changes through F-6/A amendment histories. The data underpins ADR index construction, ADR-only ETF screens, and vendor corporate-actions feeds.
Researchers in finance, law, and international economics study cross-listing premiums, bonding effects, fee evolution, and the decline of sponsored programs. They use the time series of F-6 and F-6/A filings, subject-issuer home jurisdictions, depositary market shares, and the textual evolution of EX-1 deposit-agreement clauses for panel construction, event studies, and multi-decade textual comparisons.
Staff reviewing foreign private issuer filings consult F-6 records alongside related Form 20-F and F-3 filings. They check consistency between cover-page representations, EX-1, EX-4, EX-5 Rule 466 certifications, and issuer eligibility status. Output supports comment-letter drafting, precedent retrieval, and policy work on the F-series framework under 17 CFR 239.36.
The use cases below name the exhibits and metadata.json fields each workflow touches in the Form F-6 Files dataset.
Construct an authoritative reference table of every sponsored ADR program by joining entities[] blocks across all F-6 records: depositary CIK and name from the (Filed by) entity, foreign issuer CIK, name, and stateOfIncorporation from the (Subject) entity, the program's durable fileNo (333-NNNNNN), filedAt, and effectivenessDate where populated. The ADS-to-underlying ratio and the registered ADS maximum are pulled from the F-6 cover (registration fee table) and the EX-1 receipt face. Output is a security-master row per program, used for ADR ETF screens, brokerage eligibility flags, and custody onboarding.
Group records by Subject fileNo and order by filedAt to chain each original F-6 to its F-6/A amendments. From each EX-1 Statement of Terms and Conditions, extract the issuance, cancellation, dividend pass-through, depositary-services, custody, and pre-release fees, then diff successive versions clause by clause. Output is a per-program fee timeline that depositary product teams use for competitive benchmarking and that custody/corporate-actions desks use to revise event templates the day a fee revision lands.
Aggregate Filer CIK against the Subject's stateOfIncorporation (SEC two-character country code such as X0-class non-US codes) over rolling windows of filedAt. Counts and registered-ADS volumes from the F-6 cover quantify each depositary's footprint by foreign jurisdiction (BNY Mellon, Citibank, Deutsche Bank, JPMorgan and others). Output drives league-table reporting, win/loss analyses on program migrations between depositaries, and territory planning for ADR sales coverage.
Index the EX-1 Form of Receipt and Statement of Terms and Conditions across all records as a precedent corpus, keyed by depositary, governing law, and filing date. Run clause-level retrieval over voting pass-through, indemnification, force majeure, sanctions/FATCA, pre-release, termination, successor depositary, and limitation-of-liability provisions, with EX-4 opinions of counsel pulled in alongside. Output supports new deposit-agreement drafts, side-by-side redlines, and disclosure checks ahead of an F-6 or F-6/A submission.
Identify records whose document set includes an EX-5 ("Certification under Rule 466") and parse the certification text for the prior reference filing's registrant name and 333-NNNNNN file number. Joining each EX-5 to the cited prior accession (often retrievable from the same monthly partition) reconstructs depositary-level Rule 466 chains in which a later F-6 inherits effectiveness from an earlier one. Output supports academic study of immediate-effectiveness practice, internal depositary tooling that pre-checks the "identical terms except ratio" condition, and Staff review of chained filings.
Parse the F-6 cover narrative for the General Instruction I representation and the Exchange Act reporting / Rule 12g3-2(b) eligibility statement, paired with the Subject's fileNo, CIK, and fiscalYearEnd from metadata.json. Cross-reference the Subject CIK against the foreign issuer's own 20-F or 6-K stream to flag programs whose underlying issuer has lapsed reporting or moved between exemption regimes. Output feeds compliance security-master flags, restricted-list audits, and mandate-eligibility checks for SEC-registered-only funds.
Use effectivenessDate (or filedAt as a proxy when effectiveness is not yet recorded) keyed by Subject fileNo and Subject CIK to construct event windows for each new F-6 and material F-6/A. Combined with the registered ADS count and ratio from the F-6 cover and EX-1, this anchors event studies on cross-listing premiums, bonding effects, liquidity migration between ADR and ordinary lines, and the long-run decline of sponsored programs across the February 1999 to present panel.
The dataset is accessible through three endpoints: a public JSON index for metadata and discovery, a full archive download, and per-container downloads partitioned by year and month. Authenticated endpoints accept the API key either as a token query string parameter or via an Authorization header.
Dataset Index JSON API: https://api.sec-api.io/datasets/form-f6-files.json
This endpoint returns dataset-level metadata (name, description, earliest sample date of 1999-02-01, last update timestamp, total records, total size, covered form types F-6 and F-6/A, container format, and file types), the full dataset download URL, and the list of all container files. Each container entry includes its key, size, record count, last updated timestamp, and download URL. Polling this endpoint is the recommended way to detect which monthly containers changed in a recent refresh and to drive incremental downloads. No API key is required to call this endpoint.
Example response:
1
{
2
"datasetId": "1f13365b-9ae0-6966-953f-522cdac270be",
3
"datasetDownloadUrl": "https://api.sec-api.io/datasets/form-f6-files.zip",
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"name": "Form F-6 Files Dataset",
5
"updatedAt": "2026-04-24T03:02:22.147Z",
6
"earliestSampleDate": "1999-02-01",
7
"totalRecords": 6850,
8
"totalSize": 147998256,
9
"formTypes": ["F-6", "F-6/A"],
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"containerFormat": "ZIP",
11
"fileTypes": ["TXT", "JSON", "HTML", "PDF"],
12
"containers": [
13
{
14
"downloadUrl": "https://api.sec-api.io/datasets/form-f6-files/2026/2026-04.zip",
15
"key": "2026/2026-04.zip",
16
"size": 1842311,
17
"records": 12,
18
"updatedAt": "2026-04-24T03:02:22.147Z"
19
}
20
]
21
}
Download Entire Dataset: https://api.sec-api.io/datasets/form-f6-files.zip?token=YOUR_API_KEY
Returns the complete dataset as a single ZIP archive containing every monthly container. Use this for a full local snapshot. This endpoint requires an API key.
Download Single Container: https://api.sec-api.io/datasets/form-f6-files/2026/2026-04.zip?token=YOUR_API_KEY
Containers are ZIP archives partitioned by year and month (<YYYY>/<YYYY>-<MM>.zip). Use the downloadUrl value from each entry in the containers array of the index JSON to fetch a specific month. This endpoint requires an API key.
The dataset covers Form F-6 registration statements and Form F-6/A amendments filed on EDGAR. Form F-6 is the Securities Act of 1933 registration statement prescribed under 17 CFR 239.36 for depositary shares evidenced by American Depositary Receipts; F-6/A is the amendment vehicle used to update or supplement a previously filed F-6.
One record is a single Form F-6 or Form F-6/A registration statement, identified by its EDGAR accession number and stored as a per-accession folder. Each folder contains a metadata.json digest of the EDGAR submission header alongside the F-6 primary document and its exhibits (EX-1 Form of Receipt and Statement of Terms and Conditions, EX-4 Opinion of Counsel, and where applicable EX-5 Certification under Rule 466).
Form F-6 is filed by the depositary bank that issues the ADRs, not by the foreign company whose shares back the program. In practice almost all filings come from a small set of depositary institutions: The Bank of New York Mellon, Citibank N.A., JPMorgan Chase Bank N.A., and Deutsche Bank Trust Company Americas. The foreign issuer appears only as the "Subject Company" on the cover page.
The dataset's earliest sample date is February 1999 and coverage runs to the present. Pre-EDGAR F-6 filings (the form was adopted in its modern form in 1983) exist only on paper at the Commission and are not part of this dataset.
The dataset is delivered as ZIP containers partitioned by year and month, with the file path pattern <YYYY>/<YYYY>-<MM>.zip. Inside each container, per-accession folders hold HTM/HTML documents (occasional PDF for specific exhibits), a JSON metadata digest, and TXT references to the EDGAR complete-submission wrapper. Image assets referenced from the HTML are excluded.
Form F-1 is filed by the foreign issuer to register its own underlying equity or debt under the Securities Act, and Form 20-F is the foreign private issuer's recurring Exchange Act annual report. Form F-6, by contrast, is filed by the depositary and registers only the ADR wrapper — the deposit agreement, fee schedule, and contractual rights of ADR holders — not the underlying foreign securities or the issuer's financials. F-6 is therefore complementary to F-1 and 20-F rather than a substitute.
Records that invoke Rule 466 carry an additional exhibit, SGML <TYPE>EX-5, captioned "Certification under Rule 466", which identifies the prior effective F-6 by registrant name and 333-NNNNNN file number and certifies that the terms of deposit are identical except for the share-to-ADS ratio. The presence or absence of EX-5 is the structural marker of Rule 466 within a record, and EDGAR labels the submission "immediately effective" in the description string. Note that the F-6EF designation itself is out of scope for this dataset; only F-6 and F-6/A form types are included.