April 20, 2022
I believe transparency in markets is extremely important. Securities Financing
Transactions or \"SFT's\" appear to be a new way to further distort markets by allowing bad actors to skirt their liabilities. Stocks are not and should never be considered fungible. For instance, one share of Apple is not equivalent to one share of Exxon. This rule has the potential to allow naked short sellers to continue to disrupt real price discovery of a stock by allowing them to kick the can so to speak almost indefinitely. This hurts real businesses who rely on real price discovery to raise capital and further their businesses and our economy. Passing rules that favor hedge funds and institutions, instead of companies and investors, creates a very toxic environment that does not foster real economic growth.
If this rule passes, I would not be surprised if a grass roots movement aimed at exposing the corruption of the US securities market becomes one of the largest global talking points. Our markets would become the laughing stock of the world. Chairman Gensler claims he aims to make markets more transparent, but the proposition of this rule says otherwise. Please do away with these SFT exchanges to protect our integrity and bring us closer to a fair market.