When a seller “naked short sells a stock” they do not own the shares they are selling and therefore are selling artificial shares. This is like counterfeiting a stock. This process creates an obvious unfair advantage to the seller and an imbalance in the market as the sell side is now increased with more shares – many of which are counterfeit. There is a time limit on how long the seller can sell these shares and be naked on the trade and the time limit is 3 days. This is where the RegSho rules come in and the data we track. If the sellers broker-dealer has not located a borrow to cover this short trade within 3 days they will need to purchase back the shares they have sold on the open market. This process is referred to as a “Buy In”.
“When it comes to illicit short selling, the shorts win over 90% of the time”
Naked Short – A license to steal?
Naked short selling is yet another creation of the securities industry and is in essence nothing more than a license to create counterfeit shares. When you are inflating the amount of stock that is outstanding in a company, this is considered counterfeiting. The rules justify the practice by saying it helps create smooth, efficient and orderly markets. Same stuff we have heard countless times around high-frequency trading, but in reality we believe this practice leads to shady characters creating unlimited supplies of counterfeit stocks which in turn results in your investment continuing to decline and you wondering why?
