May 4, 2009
I am a strong advocate of the uptick rule. I day-traded for 3 years and for the 1st year and a half, the uptick rule was in place. The markets functioned in an orderly fashion and when I tried to short, I had to abide by that rule. For the next 1.5 years the uptick rule was removed and the markets were in chaos, behaving completely irrationally. If a company missed the whisper, the stock plunged 10-20% in one day. That is absurd and I'm convinced it was collaboration among hedge funds to jump on bad news and crush those stocks. That doesn't do anything but hurt real investors. You should be protecting the rights and fair market behavior for the small investors, not for the hedge funds.