Slide Fire Solutions, which holds several patents and describes itself as ‘the official bump stock’ will cease taking orders for its products

The leading maker of the rapid-fire accessory used by the shooter in the Las Vegas massacre will stop selling the devices next month.

Slide Fire Solutions, which holds several patents and describes itself as “the official bump stock”, has been under mounting pressure since 58 people were killed and hundreds injured when a 64-year-old man opened fire on concertgoers last October.

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After 17 people were killed at a Florida high school in February, Donald Trump ordered the US justice department to ban bump stocks, which were not used by the shooter in that incident.

A notice on the company website states: “On Sunday, May 20, 2018 at midnight CST, Slide Fire will cease taking orders for its products and shut down its website. Orders placed prior to May 20th, 2018 will all be processed and shipped.”

Bump stock devices use the recoil energy of a semiautomatic rifle to slide the gun back and forth, creating continuous fire with one pull of the trigger to simulate a fully automatic weapon.

Under the Obama administration, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) examined bump stocks and decided that they could not be banned under existing law.

But on 23 March, the justice department issued a proposal to amend firearms regulations to classify bump-stock devices as machine guns, allowing them to be prohibited. “These devices convert an otherwise semiautomatic firearm into a machine gun,” the notice states. “With limited exceptions, primarily as to government agencies, the [Gun Control Act of 1968] makes it unlawful for any person to transfer or possess a machine gun.”

Jeff Sessions, the attorney general, said in a statement: “After the senseless attack in Las Vegas, this proposed rule is a critical step in our effort to reduce the threat of gun violence that is in keeping with the Constitution and the laws passed by Congress.”

The decision is likely to face court challenges from gun owners who may argue that only Congress has the authority to outlaw bump stocks. But if it is enacted after the 90-day review period, owners and retailers will be required to destroy the devices or turn them over to the ATF, which estimates that the public has purchased about 520,000.

Florida passed a state law last month which bans bump stocks, among other gun restrictions. They are also explicitly or implicitly banned in California, New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts and Washington state, and the city of Denver.

Slide Fire, which could not be reached by phone on Wednesday morning, dominates the bump stocks market. It was founded in 2010 by Jeremiah Cottle, an air force veteran, in the remote and small Texas town of Moran.

He sold over $10m worth of equipment in his first year, according to Bloomberg Businessweek, giving the struggling town an economic jolt. But the success story soured after the Vegas shooting, when media reports described Cottle as looking distressed.

Following Vegas, the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence filed an ongoing class-action lawsuit against bump stock manufacturers and retailers, arguing that by in effect turning semiautomatic guns into machine guns, they were circumventing the law.