May 13, 2009
Please don't change the short selling rules in the marketplace, though if you have to, please just add the uptick rule as it always was. Don't try to fiddle with rules because there will be unintended consequences. For example, if you minimize short selling, you will lose a LOT of upward momentum in stocks when shorts get squeezed. You will lose upward momentum and that's what you want to avoid. Of course, also, shorts provide a hedge, a risk mitigation ability, for those of us invested in the market. Without the ability to hedge, we can't invest at all and you will lose investors/traders.
I am sure that modifying short selling rules to something we haven't had before will turn out to be bad for the marketplace as a whole. We need an even playing field - if you restrict short selling, are you going to restrict long buying too?
Please allow us to hedge our risks and stay in the market.
-Rachael Robiner
Trader