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Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

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Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#851

Post by thereare5lights »

mcguire wrote: post #824
thereare5lights wrote: post #755

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does this address the assertion that there's already been research out of Asia that says masks are effective against these kind of viruses?

Honestly, I'm not sure what you're asking. Some kind of admission that the US health field ignored research because "eww, icky Asians?" Evidence that the US health experts knew of the research but are Snidely Whiplash-ish, mustache-twirling evil? As far as I can tell, they're just as confused as any other scientist trying to do their best, with the additional constraint that they have to provide an answer to a questi…

You said

> Prior to 2020, most medical professionals believed most viruses, and corona viruses particularly, could not be transported as aerosols. This was a subject of research where the data had not come in.

cactus2093 replied

> I've also looked into it a little and come to the opposite conclusion. Here is one study from Singapore in 2014 that showed surgical and n95 have about a 68% and 95% efficacy respectively at preventing SARS transmission https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4293989/ Masks have also been shown to provide protection against the common cold (many strains of which are also coronaviruses) and seasonal flus https://www.livescience.com/7661-masks-protect-colds-flu.htm...

There's two ways I can see you interpreting this.

1) You are being extremely narrow in your focus and saying that you are talking specifically about viruses being transmitted as aerosols (although the overarching topic here is about whether or not masks are effective). And thus, since there was no research specifically about this, then there's no reason to recommend masks. This doesn't address the point that there's research that shows masks are effective against similar kinds of viruses.

2) You actually are talking about effectiveness of masks and saying that viruses could not be transmitted via aerosol was to say that because they are not shown to be transmitted via aerosol, then there's no evidence that masks would work, in which case, again, we're back to the issue that there was research prior to 2020 that showed masks are effective against similar kinds of viruses.

So the question remains, are you wrong about your assertion that

> Prior to 2020, most medical professionals believed most viruses, and corona viruses particularly, could not be transported as aerosols. This was a subject of research where the data had not come in.

and if not, what are we missing about what you're trying to say?

> Some kind of admission that the US health field ignored research because "eww, icky Asians?"

There was certainly the perception that Asians wearing masks was ridiculous. Whether or not this perception extended to American experts and influenced their conclusions is unknown to me.

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#852

Post by jayd16 »

kypro wrote: post #781
numair wrote: post #107

Okay kids, story time. After the crash of 2008, I spent some time working with Dick Fuld. Yes, the former head of Lehman Brothers. Yes, the one people describe as “disgraced,” among other terms. Here’s the irony, though — Dick was one of the only people I encountered at that level of business/finance who wasn’t a scumbag. Unlike so many virtue-signaling Silicon Valley darlings, the guy behind the curtain was an honor…

Can someone explain why my perspective is wrong on hedgefunds please? My understanding is that the GFC happened because the whole economy was levered to hell. At the risk of referencing the big short, there was a scene in that film where a stripper has levered herself up so much she owns five home. The reason the GFC happened was in reality because average people were levered up on real estate and couldn't afford the…

When an individual is over leveraged the individual is at risk. When a bank (loosely speaking; financial entity, what have you) is over leverage, the customers are at risk.

If a bank falters more people are going to be upset. That's just the nature of the situation.

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#853

Post by mariodiana »

nsonha wrote: post #98
mariodiana wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no "probably." It is well-known that people leave their civil servant jobs at regulatory industries, after putting in their time, and bring their know-how and connections to big banks and hedge funds in return for cushy salaries.

Worked in a broker in Australia, our head of compliance is a former ASIC (the Australian regulator) employee.

There is an NPR (National Public Radio) show called "This American Life" and several years back it had an episode devoted to this. They interviewed regulators. The big banks, for instance, will have an office on site for a regulator. The pull is to "go native" at some point.

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#854

Post by kypro »

lazyasciiart wrote: post #832
kypro wrote: post #828

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> All of them deserve blame BUT the hedge funds and mortgage brokers got bailouts and the home buyers didnt. That smells like BS to me and anger at the people that allowed that to happen, hedge funds and bankers included, looks justified to me What bail outs are you referring to? Are you talking about the TARP program? Because didn't most of that go to banks (not hedge funds) and wasn't that actually a net benefit to…

> To blame the hedge funds for this you would first have to assume they planned to take down the global economy No, you absolutely don't. Consider criminal charges - they differentiate between intentional harm, reckless harm and negligent harm, but they all blame the guy being charged.

Sorry I should have been more specific – I don't understand why people are blaming the hedge funds for bail outs. If you're going to blame anyone for the TARP program surely it would be the government?

I do get why people are angry at those who recklessly over leveraged, although I would still argue that this is more of regulatory issue. If you allow people to take reckless financial risks some percentage of people will always do it.

It's also no reason to be angry at hedge funds as a collective, in the same way it would be silly to be angry at all mortgage owners (past & present) for the GFC.

However, if you're saying it's fine to blame the individual hedge funds involved in the GFC for reckless harm and negligence then I would would tend to agree, but that doesn't appear to be what's happening.

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#855

Post by SpicyLemonZest »

blackearl wrote: post #847
SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #333

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point is that it's not fine. The institutional investors who have historically said it was fine were wrong. If the average retail investor comes away thinking scummy tactics are cool now that you and I can use them, it'll be a disaster for the cause of real financial reform.

It's hypocritical to only now be concerned with "scummy tactics" when the little people found a way to turn them on the big money. No one seemed to really care until hedge funds started losing billions due to a situation they created.

I'm just not sure what to tell you here. I'm not gonna support unethical trading practices because other people might have hypocritical reasons to oppose them. Again, it's not just this one event; I really am worried that the SEC will be unable to implement market reforms here because Robinhood traders argue it's their turn to exploit the system.

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#856

Post by zapataband1 »

kypro wrote: post #828
TearsInTheRain wrote: post #815

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You want to blame the regulators but imho any system that relies solely regulators is going to be fragile. The regulators always have a chance of being captured by the industry or just plain incompetent. We have a culture of people not feeling the negative repercussions of "bad actions". Buying multiple homes was irresponsible, mortgage brokers immediately selling every loan is a moral hazard and Wall street levering…

> All of them deserve blame BUT the hedge funds and mortgage brokers got bailouts and the home buyers didnt. That smells like BS to me and anger at the people that allowed that to happen, hedge funds and bankers included, looks justified to me What bail outs are you referring to? Are you talking about the TARP program? Because didn't most of that go to banks (not hedge funds) and wasn't that actually a net benefit to…

I agree with you that the regulators are to blame, but wall street (regulators, ratings agencies, banks, funds) seem to consistently break the law with no consequence. All of these are largely responsible for the deregulation that allowed these financial instruments to become legal. We need consequences or this system will remain broken, I think. Fraud is a crime that many lower class people consistently go to prison for. It's times like these that I personally realize that MLK was right when he said the system we have in place is not justice, it makes a mockery of justice. These people/institutions continue to get richer without repercussions, and ready to benefit during the recovery from every crash meanwhile poor people get shafted.

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#857

Post by dang »

relaxing wrote: post #805
dang wrote: post #766

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are other ways to make such points which don't break the site guidelines. You're ignoring the damage to the community that I'm writing about, which is much more important. Massive, low-information, vicious flamewars are the biggest existential threat to the community. I don't believe that either the commenter or the upvoters wanted an off-topic flamewar to be pinned at the top of the most popular thread on HN's…

OP directly addresses the topic with the goal of improving the community. That you think it is both OT and malicious makes me incredibly sad. Calling that particular subset of voters thoughtless because you disagree with them is a nasty brand of solipsism.

I said it was not malicious!

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#858

Post by nrmitchi »

lazyasciiart wrote: post #834
caffeine wrote: post #788

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not against charging certain actors in the 2008 crisis with fraud and manipulation either. The 2008 recession is not really a comparable event to the current GME short squeeze. It was rather a broad series of events, most of which were unfortunately legal, some of which were probably not. In that case I would be in favour of charging the ratings agencies with fraud, and possibly the financial regulators with gro…

Do you think that something like "Elon Musk tweets the word 'bitcoin'" can/should actually be charged as market manipulation? What about people selling their newsletter of stock tips? What about printing an article in Bloomberg suggesting that XYZ is undervalued/overvalued for $reasons? What about some nobody on reddit posting to wsb to say let's go to $321! What about being paid to tell clients what you think they s…

I feel like this question is a trap, but I'm bored, so I'll give it a shot.

First off, not all "market manipulation" is illegal. If it was, a company announcing a new product would be "market manipulation", because it impacts the stock price. But I think you're right that the line is definitely grey in a lot of situations. And really, that's why we have courts.

> Do you think that something like "Elon Musk tweets the word 'bitcoin'" can/should actually be charged as market manipulation?

If Elon Musk had just bought a whole bunch of bitcoin, then tweeted it out, and then sold his newly acquired bitcoin, then yes. He 100% knows that what he tweets affects markets, and attempted to directly benefit from it. If you want to argue that he doesn't know that his tweets affect the market, the SEC has already determined that it does based on the "TSLA private at 420" situation.

> What about people selling their newsletter of stock tips?

Market manipulation requires actual market manipulation. I dno't believe that "attempted market manipulation" counts (but I may be wrong). All of these newsletter attempts fail, so there's nothing to really charge.

If any of these newsletters actually have a measurable effect, or if the person sending them is buying-sending-selling (at a profit), then yes, it is market manipulation.

> What about printing an article in Bloomberg suggesting that XYZ is undervalued/overvalued for $reasons

This is kind of what Bloomberg does, and they typically have arguments in both directions (which I think kind of evens it out). That being said, true information, with real evidence, is not illegal market manipulation. DFV's initial "due diligence" and legitimate bull case are not illegal market manipulation.

> What about some nobody on reddit posting to wsb to say let's go to $321!

Now you're getting grey. I'm not qualified to answer. This answer will likely be very similar to whether or not something is "inciting a riot", and will be super context-dependent.

But note that this is different than saying "GME is going to $1000 because of " (especially if you already have a position, and if you make a profit as a result of the market that you influenced. Remember, if you don't actually influence the market, then it doesn't count.

But whether or not you succeeded in influencing the market can easily be determined after-the-fact. Just because you get away with it in the moment, doesn't mean no one will look back.

> What about being paid to tell clients what you think they should invest in?

If this is your job, you are likely licenced in some way, and the rules are likely different.

> What about telling other users on reddit for free what you think they should invest in?

I think the answer here is the same as the WSB-specific question

---

Feel free to disagree with me, these are just my opinions, and again, context matters.

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#859

Post by SkyPuncher »

orestarod wrote: post #808
fnimick wrote: post #794

Earlier quoted context omitted.

100% this. Price manipulation to trigger a short squeeze is explicitly illegal. https://www.sec.gov/investor/pubs/regsho.htm section 7. Anyone who told others to buy and hold with promises of short covering and higher prices is party to market manipulation, and it is absolutely, definitely illegal. Whether they'll be able to unmask and charge people behind the anonymity of WSB is another question though.

How can that even be remotely true. Virtually every comment there explicitly states it does not constitute financial advice.

And that disclaimer that gets posted on Facebook all the time isn't legally binding.

That gets posted to remind people that WSB is a bunch of random people on the internet. They have no duty to anyone.

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#860

Post by SkyPuncher »

youkoulele wrote: post #137
gjsman-1000 wrote: post #3

"The Commission will closely review actions taken by regulated entities that may disadvantage investors or otherwise unduly inhibit their ability to trade certain securities. In addition, we will act to protect retail investors when the facts demonstrate abusive or manipulative trading activity that is prohibited by the federal securities laws. Market participants should be careful to avoid such activity." This shoul…

Why would the SEC punish Robinhood for not having enough collateral to trade very volatile stocks.

Information I've seen is they selectively applied that ruling.

"Big fish" were still able to get an account manager to process their trades while the button buy was disabled for everything else.

There's also a seeming conflict of interest with Citadel's involvement in both RH and Melvin.

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