Feb. 7, 2022
Good afternoon. I'm sure you're being inundated with emails so I shall keep this short, or will attempt to. I consider myself one of the group of investors that the large companies, mainstream media, investing "journalists" etc. refer to as "retail" while pushing the narrative that "retail" investors are not serious investors, while simultaneously attempting to blame "retail" investors for extreme market fluctuations and swings. My son and I are small investors, and yes, we are new investors, because until somewhat recently, specifically when my mother-in-law passed away and left my wife (an only child) a rather large life insurance payout, we simply did not have the money to invest in the stock market. I have a Business degree, and I gave my son a crash course in investing, but we are mostly self-educated when it comes to the market. It's become very apparent to us that investors such as ourselves have little-to-no impact on the market, but that the prices are influenced by people with simply obscene amounts of money who are intent on making even larger amounts of money and who do not balk at breaking any rules or regulations if the fine for doing so, should they even be caught and fined, is far less than the profit they can make. It is apparent to me that when the penalty for breaking the law is insignificant while the profit to be made is significantly great, bad people will continue to break the law and happily pay any fines they may be assessed. May. This is assuming the laws are even enforced. Thank you for your time, and I hope you will do the right thing. John Pattison