6 posts tagged “sec”
Leveraged funds such as Direxion Daily Financial Bull 3X(FAS Quote) and Daily Financial Bear 3X(FAZ Quote) as well as ProShares Ultra Short Real Estate(SRS Quote) have also sparked the ire of regulators, skeptical of sales practices. A number of firms, including UBS and Ameriprise, have halted the sales of such products to their clients. The scrutiny of these funds has been led by the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA).
Just more nanny government and "prudent man rule" garbage. Every investor should have a good understanding of what they are buying and regulators are supposed to enforce existing rules.
Goldman Sachs Software
“The bank has raised the possibility that there is a danger that
somebody who knew how to use this program could use it to manipulate
markets in unfair ways,” Mr. Facciponti said in the court, according to
Bloomberg. “The copy in Germany is still out there, and we at this time
do not know who else has access to it.”
Rouge Traders
The spike in oil prices to
their highest level this year was caused by a rogue broker
who placed a massive bet in the Brent oil market, triggering almost
$10m of losses for his company. PVM Oil Associates, the world’s largest over-the-counter oil
brokerage, said on Thursday it had been the “victim of unauthorized
trading”. The privately owned company said that as a result of the unauthorized trades it had been forced to close substantial volumes of
futures contracts at a loss.
Government Intervention
Since the CFTC limits the number of futures contracts that can be held
in agricultural products in order to protect the market from
manipulation, CFTC Chairman Gensler thinks the same standards should apply to energy
markets. Result: driving down natural gas to unnatural levels.
The problems with naked short selling have been all over the
mainstream media. But hardly a peep when clearing firms fail to deliver
stock after a trade. It's analogous to selling a product on EBay and
then failing to ship it
to the buyer.
Here is the list of Threshold Securities from yesterday.
Please contact your Congressperson and the SEC. Tell then to start enforcing existing law (Section 17A of the 1934 Securities Exchange Act)!
That is what Bloomberg reports as of February 9, 2009 has been committed on behalf of the American taxpayer to bail out America's finance system and stimulate the economy. Only a small percentage of this money--$1.68 trillion--has been voted on by Congress. The vast majority of the spending, $8.1 trillion, has been off the Congressional books and made by the Federal Reserve and FDIC.
- The amount is equal to almost two-thirds of the value of everything produced in the US during 2008.
- It is enough to pay off 90% of the mortgages in the United States--$10.5 trillion would pay for all mortgages, according to the Federal Reserve.
- It is $30,000 for every man, woman and child in America.
- It would be enough to send a $1,430 check to every man, woman and
child alive in the world.
My earlier post detailed the problem. Now I find out the NYSE publishes a daily list of stocks that have naked short sellers. Of course they don't call it that, they use Orwellian double-speak and call them Threshold Securities. If you go through the list day by day, you'll probably find a stock you own!
Remember, this practice is illegal yet no one at the SEC or in our phony government seems to be enforcing the rule of law.
1/07/2009 Follow Up
WASHINGTON, Jan 6 (Reuters) - Proposals by a U.S. Treasury market industry group to allow participants to charge their counterparties for failure to deliver securities on time will improve market liquidity, a Treasury official said on Tuesday.
"The practical measures recommended by the TMPG should serve to minimize episodes of chronic fails, promote overall market liquidity, and enhance the operational integrity of the Treasury market place," said Karthik Ramanathan, acting Assistant Secretary for Financial Markets.
Ramanathan was responding to proposals announced on Monday by the Treasury Market Practices Group (TMPG) that market participants should from May 1 start gathering data on so-called "fails" where securities have not been provided by the scheduled settlement date.
TMPG was formed by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York to address market manipulation.The problems with naked short selling have been all over the mainstream media. But hardly a peep when clearing firms fail to deliver stock after a trade. It's analogous to selling a product on EBay and then failing to ship it to the buyer. This practice has skewed the market in the favor of the large hedge funds.
The podcast below is about an hour. Please contact your Congressperson and the SEC. Tell then to start enforcing existing law (Section 17A of the 1934 Securities Exchange Act)!
