Aug. 16, 2022
August 16, 2022 As a retail investor, I depend on what little information I can get. When the proposed increased transparency was announced, I was happy. I need to be able to know who is shorting what companies. Short sales in the dark keep me ignorant of the risks. I felt the proposal was indicative of the SEC striving to fulfill its mandate. I like the transaction-by-transaction reporting because it right now, much of that risk only appears in aggregate, released after a useful window. I think retail investors, individual companies, and the market as a whole suffer from long, hidden lending chains. Currently, I fear that securities lending hides dangerous chains of obligation, with market-wide risks. Consequently, the transparency of the 15-minute reporting justifies the expense. I am less familiar with the effect on individual companies, but at the least companies have a right to defend themselves against short selling in the dark, which ruins price discovery. A few short-selling entities \"know best\" beating down companies kept as ignorant as retail seems repugnantly like capitalism in service of finance. So, when I saw the proposal, I was cheered. When I saw the scramble by financial entities to overturn the proposal, I became scared. The proposal is strong, good, and beneficial to a wide range of interests. Only one sector -- finance -- benefits from its rejection.