March 6, 2009
Please forward this the SEC Chairman, Mary Schapiro.
This is a copy of the email I sent to the President. Please take it under serious consideraion and do it quickly, as the global economy has suffered enough.
Email to the President:
If you want to stop the free-fall in the stock market, which most economist and the administration
believe to be a leading economic indicator and sign of confidence (and I don't disagree), you
must get the SEC to reinstate the up-tic rule.
The up-tic rule requires a short seller to initiate the short sale only when the price ticks-up or is at
a higher price than the previous sale. It is no coincidence that the credit crisis began and has
gotten progressively worse since the up-tick rule was eliminated. Please keep in mind that the
rule was lifted in July 2007 and the Hedge Funds in particular, have been going to town on the
financial firms ever since.
The up-tick rule was originally put in place to prevent "bear raid'" which is exactly Lehman
Brothers, Bear Sterns, Washington Mutual and a whole host of other financial institutions
expoerienced in the last 20 months.
Please look into this before GE, Citi, Bank of America and eventually JP Morgan Chase suffer
the same demise.
There is no downside in reinstating this rule. In fact this alone, will give you stimulus package
to work.