May 10, 2009
Please reinstate the uptick rule and enforce the ban on naked short selling. If it means doubling the budget of the SEC then so be it, compare this to the bailouts I am paying for as a taxpayer. The purpose of the financial markets are to bring together suppliers of capital (investors) and users of capital (businesses trying to expand). If you look at the trading statistics of the various U.S. stock markets you can tell by the high level of program trades that these markets have been hi-jacked by hedge funds, etc, solely trying to make a quick buck. A sad number of these outfits could care less about the greater public good and would ruin a viable company (throwing people out of work) if it were profitable for them to do so. I am sure there are smarter people out there that could refute what I have just typed but I base my case on the near meltdown we just experienced in the banking system. How can shoddy subprime lending standards on residential real estate basically render the entire U.S. banking system insolvent (as was reflected in the market caps of our major financial institutions in early march). The recent meltdown can't be solely blamed unscrupulous short sellers - think wall street greed with their fee generating CDO's. I think the people in charge of the SEC should be less concerned at how academia judges them and more concerned at how history will judge them.