Article: Phantom shares

Article - Media

Phantom shares

Jonathan E. Johnson III

The Washington Times, 21 November 2007

In the late 1800s, American financier Daniel Drew refined the art of selling counterfeit shares. Drew’s biographer wrote, “There is no limit to the amount of blank shares a printing press can turn out. White paper is cheap… printer’s ink is also cheap.” Today, it is possible to counterfeit shares electronically — and it happens with such frightening regularity and impunity that Drew would be proud.

Access archived page.

Article: Overstock.com Congratulates Bloomberg Television for Its Emmy Nomination for ‘Phantom Shares’, a Special Report on Naked Short Selling

Article - Media, Publications

Overstock.com Congratulates Bloomberg Television for Its Emmy Nomination for ‘Phantom Shares’, a Special Report on Naked Short Selling

PRNewswire, 02 November 2007

Bloomberg Television’s special report on naked short selling entitled “Phantom Shares” was nominated for an Emmy(R) Award for Business & Financial Reporting by the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences. The report, which was nominated for outstanding investigative reporting of a business news story – news magazines and long form, featured Overstock.com and its Chairman and CEO, Patrick Byrne, extensively. It examined the strategy and execution of naked short selling, the threat this poses to American entrepreneurship, and the steps regulators are taking to control it.

Patrick Byrne said of the news, “Unsettled trades in our stock settlement system present a serious problem to our capital markets. Bloomberg’s report shed light on the issue and brought it into the mainstream. It is an example of the critical, investigative mindset that is essentially absent within American financial journalism, and I am pleased to see Bloomberg being recognized for its fine work.”

Read Full Article

THE DOLLAR HAS NO INTRINSIC VALUE : DO YOUR ASSETS?