September 27, 2009
I don't personally know anyone participating in the upcoming round table on short selling.
"Roundtable participants will include representatives of corporate issuers, financial services firms, beneficial owner lenders, lending agents, borrowers of securities, self-regulatory organizations, international regulators and the academic community".
Of the all the people that I do know personally none has ever short sold a share of stock. Yet trillions of dollars worth of shares are shorted. I doubt that this would be happening if there wasn't a pretty good profit in it.
Most people who have money invested in the market (I'm not talking about a lot of money but enough to represent their life's savings) don't know what short selling is. Most are too busy providing the nation with "Capital Formation" to find out. It is their fear of losing all that they have worked for that has made short sellers so successful. I believe these investors deserve protection.
"The mission of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is to PROTECT investors, maintain FAIR, orderly, and efficient markets, and facilitate CAPITAL FORMATION."
It is a fundamentaly "unfair" practice to allow anyone to sell anything that someone else owns for less than what they could get for it themselves.
Short sellers will be heavily represented at the Round table discussion. They will be claiming to perform a valuable service (something to do with price discovery) Still, I don't think they provide a more valuable service than those misinformed/uninformed individuals who invested in good faith. So I don't think it would be unfair for the SEC to provide some oversight as to how short sellers do business.
Please tell the round table that I would like to see the uptick rule reinstated.