May 30, 2009
Dearest Mary Shapiro:
I am not and will never be a sophisticated Wall Street SHARK. I am just a 65 year old women trying to make sense of WHY? in less than 10 years the meager retirement funds that I accumulated (so that I can attempt to be
self-sufficient in my older years) has TWICE been stolen
in this country's stock market by all the shenanigans and games that is everyday occurring on Wall Street. I cannot believe that this country's historic principles in the business and market place have been so degraded
and with such utter disregard--to the point of literally almost totally destroying the foundation of what we call capitalism. And, as I come to understand in the last 9 months that this all took place because of either outright corruption, political self interest or by the incredible INCOMPETENCE of the people (either elected or appointed to be the guardians of capitalism) has raised my ire and anger to limits that I cannot easily express with words here.
I have lost total faith in the previous belief that there
were checks and balances and well thought-out laws and
regulations.
The abolition of this previously instituted uptick rule
that subsequently allowed any naive person that held stocks to be blindly ravaged by the naked short selling
that I observed during September/October 2008 was reprehensible. I could not believe as I watched the market day after day, as both sound and badly positioned companies were torn to shreds. It was like watching the core of capitalism being REPEATEDLY RAPED. And, all
we could do is watch in paralyzing fear and panic--as 90% of us didn't understand what was REALLY happening, let alone know what we should do defensively to protect our trivial investments, as this tsunami of greed continued.
I, like many others, are now more knowledgeable as the postmortem continues. I know that I am not the only one
with no confidence or trust about anything to do with
Wall Street. Between the continuing human initiated
short-selling, the financial system still in complete control of the same greedy lobbyists, and more than 50% of trading (including automated short-selling) being carried out by rooms full of COMPUTERS, the little guy doesn't stand a chance.
We are not stupid anymore. I, personally, don't see
investing in the stock market as any different that going
to Las Vegas--the house always wins you fool You don't
stand a chance.
If there is any expectation that this economy will try to
upright itself, and ever hopes to lure the small retail
investor back into the market, the playing field had better be made more level and inviting.
So, a step in that direction would be to reinstate the
uptick rule. If not, I personally will not by another
stock in my life...the hell with the whole thing. The
long-term destruction that has been created will not be
recovered for more than a decade, certainly in my life
time. Not having the rule will only continue to make
vulnerable the financial foundation that is critical.
The country will continue to be a target for the next
wave of creative, greedy, shortsighted, self-serving individuals. Someone needs to police this activity and GUARANTEE that this will never happen again. We would
not be in the current crisis if this uptick rule had been in force.
My choice(s) in the implementation of the pending legislation is the following from the offered options:
Market-Wide, Permanent Approach
Proposed Uptick Rule: A market-wide short sale price test based on the last sale price or tick (a proposed uptick rule).
Security-Specific, Temporary Approach
Circuit Breaker: A circuit breaker that would either:
Impose a short sale price test based on the last sale price in a particular security for the remainder of the day if there is a severe decline in price in that security (a proposed circuit breaker uptick rule).
Judith Conway
Breckenridge, Colorado