And we thought the FDIC’s public comment period was comic. Try the SEC’s recent disclosure on comments that have flooded in for short selling rules. (And don’t forget to pick up a “Don’t Short Me Bro!” Mug before the rule returns. Here is but a sample:
Free trade must not be eliminated , however , pointedly aggressive short selling must end . I believe in free trade , I am a begining [sic] investor , I am an American Citizen and I lost on 900 shares of Washington Mutual . I would not like to lose again . Thank you , Ed .
My preferences are as follows
1. Prohibit short sales totally in US markets.
2. If US firms engage in short sales in foreign markets, profits should be taxed at 80%. Firms and/or individuals found in violation of the tax regulation will face jail-time not less than ten years per transaction. Foreign individuals will be deported for life.
The SEC needs to decide whether where the stock market belongs. Right now it belongs in Las Vegas. It is a casino. Investing has become syonymous [sic] with gambling. There is no difference. Investing should mean that you are buying shares in a company to help them succeed – and then reaping the reward from their success. Investing should not mean creatively buying or selling articificial [sic] tokens that are being artificially manipulated up or down by a community far removed from the companies that those tokens are meant to represent. Short selling is just another means of gambling. I can see no honorable reason for short selling whatsoever. Don’t restore the uptick rule – abolish short selling altogether. I would go further even. Investing in a company should be just that – if you buy shares, then you should be required to hold them for a reasonable amount of time or pay a significant penalty. Ultra short term gains should be taxed out of existance [sic] – its not investing it is gambling.
But for bold regulatory comment period audacity, you just don’t get any better than Benjamin N. Dover III, recreated in full, after the jump.
April 20, 2009
VIA EMAIL
Re: File No. S7-08-09
Chairman Schapiro:
On behalf of the great silent majority of American investors, I must point out that none of your proposals to reinstate the “uptick rule” goes far enough toward ensuring a perpetual rise in stock prices. Rather than tinkering with ad hoc half-measures, the SEC should be proposing the only practical, efficient and final solution to market volatility: a ban on stock selling altogether. A review of six time-honored truths makes this solution self-evident:
Truth #1: Stock Market Crashes Are Caused By Stock Sales.
It should be painfully obvious by now that the market’s decline since November 2007 was caused by stock selling. Not even pernicious speculators like George Soros would dispute this basic truth. Similarly, the market’s steep fall after several large bank failures and the deepening of the economic crisis in September 2008 also was the result of stock selling. We can safely conclude, therefore, that had stock sales been banned in 2007 the stock market crash of 2008-2009 never would have happened. Logically, it follows that banning stock sales would also prevent future market crashes.
Truth # 2: True Investors Buy And Hold. Forever.
Equities markets were never intended to be casinos where gamblers make wagers on or against a particular outcome. They are the mechanism for long-term investors to provide the capital that investment banks and brokerage firms need to grow profits. The only justifiable investment strategy from a policy standpoint, and the only strategy that any right-minded investor — as opposed to speculator — would employ, is the tried and true “buy and hold” strategy. Speculators trade; investors buy stocks and maintain them in their portfolios in perpetuity. As the Oracle of Omaha, Jimmy Buffett, has famously declared, an investor’s time horizon should be “forever.” Thus, there is no legitimate reason for an investor ever to sell a stock.
Truth # 3: “Buy And Hold” Guarantees An Ever-Rising Market.
A large and growing part of individual Americans’ wealth is composed of equities. If all investors were simply required to adhere to the “buy and hold” strategy as they should, the market would rise without the interruption of “corrections” and bear markets. As all buyers hold, and new entrants buy, stock prices would move upward in a linear trajectory. Extensive research studies by large brokerage firms have proven that, over time, stock prices rise. For example, an investor who had bought the Dow Jones Industrial Average in 1932, when it was at 50, and sold it in November 2007, when it was over 14,000, would have realized a gain of approximately 28,000% — an annualized return of over 370%. A ban on stock sales would ensure an ever-rising stock market and thus greater wealth and prosperity for all Americans. Stock sellers, by contrast, are interfering with the market’s natural tendency to ascend.
Truth # 4: A Rising Market Makes People Happy.
Studies have demonstrated a marked correlation between the level of the Dow, on the one hand, and consumer and voter sentiment, on the other. The most recent University of Michigan Survey showed improving consumer sentiment as the Dow rose sharply after the announcement of the proposed re-instatement of the uptick rule, the modification of mark-to-market accounting, and the Treasury’s plan to subsidize the sale of banks’ toxic assets with taxpayer leverage. Similarly, polls have shown that voters are often less happy when the stock market crashes. They are also less likely to re-elect incumbents, including those who appoint the heads of regulatory agencies. A rising market also pleases investment banks and other firms in the financial services industry, including those that routinely hire former heads of regulatory agencies. Enough said.
Truth # 5: The SEC’s Job Is To Stay Out Of The Market When It’s Rising And Step In To Appropriately Alter The Rules When It’s Falling.
The SEC’s regulatory mandate in a laissez-faire economy is two-fold. When stock prices are increasing, the SEC’s role is to ignore the market and market participants, thus allowing the invisible forces of the market to work their unregulated magic. When stock prices are decreasing, however, the SEC must intervene to stanch the loss of wealth that flows from a declining market. There is nothing “artificial” about selectively modifying rules that interfere with the market’s natural upward trajectory.
Truth # 6: Stock Sellers Are Short On America.
Speculators, short-sellers, long-sellers and other suspicious elements will spuriously claim that stock sales (and even short sales) are necessary for the efficient functioning of the market, and that asymmetrical transaction rules might actually exacerbate the problem by facilitating stock market bubbles. It suffices to note that these are the same people who caused the recent stock market crash (as well as every previous stock market crash in history). They are also the ones who sold stock in the wake of the September 11th attacks, thereby profiting from the nation’s tragedy. It is no exaggeration to say that those who oppose a stock sale ban are advocating nothing less than a form of economic terrorism.
I have no doubt that, as a patriotic American, you will see through the terrorists’ chicanery and lay the groundwork for a safe and prosperous America by banning stock sales.
Benjamin N. Dover III
Comments On File S7-08-09 [SEC.gov]
Count on Ben Dover…
Dover? The guy’s name is Dover? It must be TGFD
uhh Bend Over?
what is this retarded bullshit – if its a joke – not funny. if not a joke – even less funny.
Dick N. Balls IV
We must send Ben over to Barnie to have a frank discussion.
At least Ben Dover’s comment is literate and not riddled with spelling mistakes.
Pay my mortgage!
I ain’t gon’ havta pay mah mortgage, I ain’t gon’ havta pay may gas…I jus’ feel like if I help him he gon’ help me.
It is a joke, it is funny, but not as funny as the fact that the SEC is treating it seriously enough to have published it! Ben Dover, sheesh, didn’t Mary Schapiro go to elementary school?? I gotta send them one too.
Mike Rotch
Nailing sheep is the new killing it old skool.
This was better than his commentary on the PPIP, but he had something similar there too.
The investor “Jimmy Buffett.” This is clearly a mocking joke. SEC probably took it seriously.
Ben Dover III is awesome. I remember reading something about PPIP along similar lines, also from this guy. Zero Hedge posted on his blog a week ago.
The SEC, in the spirit of full transparency, publishes all comments received.
They may get around to reconsidering that stance. The interwebs makes it a little too easy for that pesky “public” to actually submit comments.
@11 Beat me to it!
-13
I first saw this guy in one of the Fletch movies.
– Amanda Hugginkiss
I remember seeing similar arguments made by a guy–I forgot his name–shortly after the Lehman implosion. I think it was Heywood something..
Awesome!!!
@17
Please tell me you get the joke. Its in the name. Your comment leads me to believe you don’t get it, which puts you right on par with the SEC.
Awesome!!!
@17
Please tell me you get the joke. Its in the name. Your comment leads me to believe you don’t get it, which puts you right on par with the SEC.
Awesome!!!
@17
Please tell me you get the joke. Its in the name. Your comment leads me to believe you don’t get it, which puts you right on par with the SEC.
Awesome!!!
@17
Please tell me you get the joke. Its in the name. Your comment leads me to believe you don’t get it, which puts you right on par with the SEC.
Awesome!!!
@17
Please tell me you get the joke. Its in the name. Your comment leads me to believe you don’t get it, which puts you right on par with the SEC.
Too Naked. Didn’t short.
900 shares of WaMu? Jesus f**ing christ.
-mrp
PV: -50
FV: 14,000
PMT:0
N: (2007-1932) = 75
Compute I: 7.8%
math challenged, much?
@18 – for the 4th time, #17 gets it. Question – what’s the last name commonly associated with the 1st name “Heywood”?
Answer correctly, and you’ll know what I mean.
–Not 17
@18: Are you retarded? Why did you post your comment so many times?
I invested all of my 401k in Enron stock.
-Barry McCochener
I agree totally with Mr. Dovers point.
Harry Peretestes
This is total BS.
Lou Stoolz
@25
I can’t tell if that was on purpose, but clearly 28,000%/75 != 373% annualized return, sigh…
hialrious [sic]
I couldn’t agree more with the idea of banning stock sales all together. Particularly for non-dividend paying ones.
“Benjamin N. Dover III”
aka. “Bart Simpson wuz here”
Mr. Dover for SEC Chairman 2010
Dover is a dick.
Mike Hunt
Ben Dover = win.
Truths #5 and #6 are amazing.
@18-22, don’t worry; I got it.
-17
“There is nothing “artificial” about selectively modifying rules that interfere with the market’s natural upward trajectory.”
Fess up DB. Ben Dover = EP + Bess?
We couldn’t agree more!
Jack Knoff
and
Kay Ryan
I think Benjamin is a genius. The only thing to add is forced stock buying for all Americans.
-Heywood Jablome
reminds me of Frederic Bastiat’s “candlemakers’ petition”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Candlemakers%27_petition
“Yes, hello? I’m looking for a Mr. Jass. Is Mr. Jass, first name Hugh, at the bar?”
“I don’t know. Let me check. Hey, everyone, is there a Hugh Jass at the bar? Anyone? Hugh Jass?”
Careful, @42, your erudition is showing. That is a dangerous characteristic to flaunt in this day and age.
Such policies should be enacted retroactively and all news stories about public companies should be vetted by the SEC to remove amy and all bias deemed to be negative.
The really funny thing is that the SEC cannot ignore these things. They have to take all of the public comments seriously. There are probably six SEC lawyers that are summarizing letters from Messrs. Dove, Peretestes and Hunt right now. I hope that they get quoted in the final releases.
Mike Hock
I’d appreciate a little seriousness from the posters, my brother Ben is doing his best to enlighten people on these issues.
Regards,
Eileen Dover
I think Ben Dover’s comments are totally unwarranted.
I hate it when my shorts get squeezed like this.
- Richard Hertz
Short sellers are un-American, Muslim, gay-loving, abortion-supporting, big-eared, New York liberals and should be deported from the U.S entirely
-Rush Limbaugh
Also, the Fed must peg interest rates at zero in perpetuity; Fed Govt must cut U.S tax rates to zero; and healthcare/college education must be free for all Americans
This might be more humorous if we all didn’t pay for the SEC to operate.