March 18, 2004
These are not my original words, but they sum up my feelings on the matter better than I could have ever done so myself...
This rule is unduly punitive to the INVESTOR.
The egregious mutual fund violations were performed by MUTAL FUND managers. By egregious I refer to after-hours trading, excessive short term trading against the rules of the fund prospectus, gaming the time-zone differential on foreign asset funds, and trading their own or family accounts using these same illegal methods. These were committed by FUNDS not individual investors.
Why penalize the investor 2 percent for legitimately trading a fund, for their own reasons, only to put that fee right back in the pockets of those known to have taken far more from the investors than the fines since levied against them. I believe the SEC has missed the mark completely with the focus on the individual.
Since the market fall, and censure or indictments against unscrupulous corporate and financial managers, the SEC has claimed to put the interests of the indivudual investor first. This proposed rule does nothing towards that end.