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Luby’s Inc. said Thursday that a regulatory panel has ordered Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC to buy back certain auction rate securities from the company.

An arbitration panel of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, or FINRA, ruled Credit Suisse was liable to Luby’s and would have to repurchase the securities and accrued interest.

Houston-based Luby’s (NYSE: LUB) had asserted it had been unable to liquidate its auction rate securities as a result of Credit Suisse’s actions.

Auction-rate securities are debt investments issued by municipalities, student-loan agencies, closed-end funds and others, with interest rates that are reset at weekly or monthly auctions run by the investment firms.

As of Feb. 10, the company’s most recent quarterly filing, Luby’s held $7.1 million par value or $5.2 million fair value in auction rate securities. As a result of the award, Luby’s expects to record a pre-tax gain of approximately $1.8 million, net of expenses, on the sale of investments in its fourth quarter fiscal 2010.

Luby’s filed the FINRA claim against Credit Suisse in October 2008. Luby’s asserted that Credit Suisse knew but failed to disclose to Luby’s that auction rate securities were only liquid at the time because broker-dealers and others were artificially supporting and manipulating the auction market to maintain the appearance of liquidity and stability.

Multiple lawsuits were filed in 2008 by various companies and authorities in Texas, New York and Massachusetts, as well as the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, related to the sale of auction-rate securities at the peak of the credit crunch and financial system meltdown.

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