Article: House Hearing: Only Jamie Dimon’s Microphone Mysteriously Malfunctions During Pivotal Questioning

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House Hearing: Only Jamie Dimon’s Microphone Mysteriously Malfunctions During Pivotal Questioning

Pam Martens and Russ Martens, 28 May 2021

CEOs from the six largest banks on Wall Street testified under oath yesterday before the House Financial Services Committee. But only one CEO, Jamie Dimon, had an ear-piercing electronic sound emanate from his microphone, which blocked out the sound of his voice, when he was asked key questions by two separate members of Congress.

The situation was so bizarre that Congressman Juan Vargas, a Democrat from California, said this about the episodes: “It reminded me of the movie ‘Young Frankenstein.’ Every time they said ‘Luther’ the horses would get scared. Every time they said ‘Jamie Dimon,’ the computers would get scared.”

The first episode occurred after Congressman Al Green, a Democrat from Texas, told Dimon that two of the banks previously purchased by JPMorgan Chase had used slaves as loan collateral and at one point, after calling in a loan, the bank actually owned 1,250 slaves. Green asked Dimon: “Will you atone in the form of recompense,” and “what will you do for your banks owning human beings…?” Continue reading “Article: House Hearing: Only Jamie Dimon’s Microphone Mysteriously Malfunctions During Pivotal Questioning”

Article: GameStop hearing targets stock lending, social media

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GameStop hearing targets stock lending, social media

Michael Shaw, 23 March 2021

Two issues emerged from a congressional hearing on the volatile trading of GameStop Corp. shares: Lawmakers and regulators need a greater understanding of how technology helped foster the frenzy, and regulators need systems to understand such events — and possibly to manage them.

House Financial Services members and witnesses spent most of their time at the hearing last week focusing on the role of short-selling in the GameStop trading frenzy in January. They specifically looked at the source of securities used to take short positions, and they looked at how a bunch of retail investors seemingly were able to outmaneuver the professionals. Continue reading “Article: GameStop hearing targets stock lending, social media”

Article: The GameStop Mess Exposes the Naked Short Selling Scam

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The GameStop Mess Exposes the Naked Short Selling Scam

LUCY KOMISAR, 25 February 2021

At the House Financial Services Committee hearing last week on the GameStop debacle, there was an elephant in the room: naked short selling.

Short selling, effectively betting that a stock will go down, involves a trader selling shares he does not own, hoping to buy them back at a lower price to make money on the spread. The trader is supposed to locate (or have a “reasonable belief” he can locate) or borrow the shares in brokerage accounts, and then transfer them to the buyer within two days. This accounts for as much as 50 percent of daily trading. Continue reading “Article: The GameStop Mess Exposes the Naked Short Selling Scam”

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