"Hello and good evening. I'd like to start by thanking you for being open to comments from retail traders. I am a retail trader from germany. I am not the most financially literate person in the room, as my experience investing has been limited to this year, but in that time I have made great strides in learning how our financial system functions. I parsed Regulatory Notice 21-19 myself so that I, as a young American and novice investor who looks forward to a lifetime of activity and learning in the free market, could provide my original thoughts. "A. Publication of Short Interest for Exchange-listed Equity Securities" I'm a bit perplexed as to why firms are currently allowed to hold ANY unreported open short positions. In the OTC market, one firm's massive short position can singlehandedly destroy a company. "B. Content of Short Interest Data" The more data points you collect and publish, the better. A free and fair market means transparency for everybody. There's no reason firms should have access to every dimension of information, while remaining entirely opaque themselves. The fact they are allowed to withhold ANY information from regulatory agencies is appalling, let alone fundamental data regarding their positions. "Proprietary and Customer Account Categorization" In favor. "Account-level Position Information" It seems essential to me that FINRA should know the identity of entities who open large short positions. You mean to tell me firms are able to create galactic-sized short positions and remain entirely anonymous--even to FINRA? "Synthetic Short Positions" Of course regulators should be able to interpret the data and assess how many synthetic shorts have been created by market participants' activity. This issue poses an existential threat to the market. I assume by "less-traditional means of establishing short interest," FINRA is referring to naked short selling. It's illegal to counterfeit securities--is it not? I don't see how naked short selling is any different. Yet it seems like the current rules allow more than enough leeway for naked short selling to happen; in fact, judging by the extremely rare and paltry fines that are typically given to market participants who practice naked short selling, one might go so far as to suggest the current rules \*incentivize\* naked short selling. "Loan Obligations Resulting From Arranged Financing:" Members should not be able to "close" shorts by borrowing shares--effectively, they are closing shorts by opening shorts, and they don't even have to report it to FINRA. That's completely absurd. "Total Shares Outstanding (TSO) and Public Float:" Yes, please. Allow FINRA to disseminate short interest data. Everybody should have access to it, if we aspire to have a free market. "Threshold Security Field" I agree with FINRA that a security's status as a threshold security is useful to investors, and that it should be disseminated accurately and transparently. "C. Frequency and Timing of Short Interest Position Reporting and Data Dissemination" The means to report short position data on a daily or even an hourly basis exist. It should be easy for market participants to abide by this rule, so long as they are keeping their books straight. No one benefits from this opacity in reporting, except for market participants who consistently choose to abuse loopholes. More energy and regulation needs to be directed towards immediate reporting and dissemination of short-interest data. D. Information on Allocations of Fail-to-Deliver Positions In favor. Transferring FTDs between firms in order to obfuscate their existence is incredibly deceptive behavior; not having to report those movements at all is unacceptable... The systemic risks posed by short sellers and their lack of oversight are well beyond what any sane market would allow for. Repeatedly failing-to-deliver shares, and systematically juggling those FTDs around and trying to hide them--I don't see how that can be interpreted as anything except collusion and fraud. "Publication of Short Interest for Exchange-listed Equity Securities" As far as costs ago, I am not giving them a second thought. There is no price for transparency in the free market. I am entirely in favor of FINRA consolidating and disseminating short interest data both for exchange-listed and OTC securities. This concludes my comments. I appreciate that FINRA is openings its ears to the voices of retail investors. Proper reform and regulation of our markets is in order if we wish to have a market that future generations will trust and want to participate in. Failure to fix our market in a meaningful way may be an existential threat to the United States' preeminent position in the global economy. The rule changes proposed by Regulatory Notice 21-19 are critically important for the health of our markets. As an individual investor who is quickly losing confidence in the ability and/or willingness of regulatory agencies to perform their primary function, I feel this Notice in particular deserves overwhelming support from all regulators and market participants, and deterministic action should be taken by FINRA to codify all of the rule changes proposed by 21-19. Thank you. Daniel Eckardt
Daniel Eckardt Comment On Regulatory Notice 21-19
"Hello and good evening. I'd like to start by thanking you for being open to comments from retail traders. I am a retail trader from germany. I am not the most financially literate person in the room, as my experience investing has been limited to this year, but in that time I have made great strides in learning how our financial system functions. I parsed Regulatory Notice 21-19 myself so that I, as a young American and novice investor who looks forward to a lifetime of activity and learning in the free market, could provide my original thoughts. "A. Publication of Short Interest for Exchange-listed Equity Securities" I'm a bit perplexed as to why firms are currently allowed to hold ANY unreported open short positions. In the OTC market, one firm's massive short position can singlehandedly destroy a company. "B. Content of Short Interest Data" The more data points you collect and publish, the better. A free and fair market means transparency for everybody. There's no reason firms should have access to every dimension of information, while remaining entirely opaque themselves. The fact they are allowed to withhold ANY information from regulatory agencies is appalling, let alone fundamental data regarding their positions. "Proprietary and Customer Account Categorization" In favor. "Account-level Position Information" It seems essential to me that FINRA should know the identity of entities who open large short positions. You mean to tell me firms are able to create galactic-sized short positions and remain entirely anonymous--even to FINRA? "Synthetic Short Positions" Of course regulators should be able to interpret the data and assess how many synthetic shorts have been created by market participants' activity. This issue poses an existential threat to the market. I assume by "less-traditional means of establishing short interest," FINRA is referring to naked short selling. It's illegal to counterfeit securities--is it not? I don't see how naked short selling is any different. Yet it seems like the current rules allow more than enough leeway for naked short selling to happen; in fact, judging by the extremely rare and paltry fines that are typically given to market participants who practice naked short selling, one might go so far as to suggest the current rules \*incentivize\* naked short selling. "Loan Obligations Resulting From Arranged Financing:" Members should not be able to "close" shorts by borrowing shares--effectively, they are closing shorts by opening shorts, and they don't even have to report it to FINRA. That's completely absurd. "Total Shares Outstanding (TSO) and Public Float:" Yes, please. Allow FINRA to disseminate short interest data. Everybody should have access to it, if we aspire to have a free market. "Threshold Security Field" I agree with FINRA that a security's status as a threshold security is useful to investors, and that it should be disseminated accurately and transparently. "C. Frequency and Timing of Short Interest Position Reporting and Data Dissemination" The means to report short position data on a daily or even an hourly basis exist. It should be easy for market participants to abide by this rule, so long as they are keeping their books straight. No one benefits from this opacity in reporting, except for market participants who consistently choose to abuse loopholes. More energy and regulation needs to be directed towards immediate reporting and dissemination of short-interest data. D. Information on Allocations of Fail-to-Deliver Positions In favor. Transferring FTDs between firms in order to obfuscate their existence is incredibly deceptive behavior; not having to report those movements at all is unacceptable... The systemic risks posed by short sellers and their lack of oversight are well beyond what any sane market would allow for. Repeatedly failing-to-deliver shares, and systematically juggling those FTDs around and trying to hide them--I don't see how that can be interpreted as anything except collusion and fraud. "Publication of Short Interest for Exchange-listed Equity Securities" As far as costs ago, I am not giving them a second thought. There is no price for transparency in the free market. I am entirely in favor of FINRA consolidating and disseminating short interest data both for exchange-listed and OTC securities. This concludes my comments. I appreciate that FINRA is openings its ears to the voices of retail investors. Proper reform and regulation of our markets is in order if we wish to have a market that future generations will trust and want to participate in. Failure to fix our market in a meaningful way may be an existential threat to the United States' preeminent position in the global economy. The rule changes proposed by Regulatory Notice 21-19 are critically important for the health of our markets. As an individual investor who is quickly losing confidence in the ability and/or willingness of regulatory agencies to perform their primary function, I feel this Notice in particular deserves overwhelming support from all regulators and market participants, and deterministic action should be taken by FINRA to codify all of the rule changes proposed by 21-19. Thank you. Daniel Eckardt