Month: July 2008
18 posts
Gary Weiss and DTCC: Roddy Boyd Responds
In an earlier item, I noted that perhaps one of the strangest things I’ve experienced as a reporter is having Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC) spokesman Stuart Z. Goldstein ignore my request for comment for several days, only to receive an answer not from Goldstein, but from then-New York Post business writer Roddy Boyd.
Short-Sellers Spin Themselves Silly, SEC Sounds Strong
After years of intermittently ignoring and whitewashing one of history’s biggest financial swindles, the Wall Street Journal today, for the first time, published some basic truths about the crime: “Illegitimate naked short selling is different from [legal short-selling]…this kind of manipulative activity can have drastic consequences…Eliminating the prospect of naked short selling will help assure investors that… when the market declines it is not because of unseen manipulators and `distort and short’ artists.”
We ♥ Jim Cramer
In “The Story of Deep Capture,” we noted that CNBC’s Jim Cramer is at the center of a clique of dishonest journalists (most of them former employees of Cramer’s website, TheStreet.com) who have spent many years taking dictation for short selling hedge funds (most of them connected to Cramer). These same journalists, we pointed out, have steadfastly denied that hedge funds commit crimes or that illegal naked short selling is a big problem.
The Sound of one Hand Clapping
As we’ve seen this issue clumsily addressed by business media over the past week, something that particularly stands out is the question of whether “naked short selling” is illegal. In one of Chairman Cox’s earliest interviews, he said that no, naked short selling is not illegal, unless it is done illegally (which he went on to explain means unless it is abused as a tool of stock manipulation).
Having Lost Control of the Narrative, They Ask For It Back
Low-rent stumble-bums (i.e., Sam Antar and Gary Weiss) don’t get to climb in the ring with Ali, but I’ll meet Dan Loeb, David Einhorn, or Steve Cohen for legitimate public debate anytime, anywhere.
How Naked Short Sellers and CNBC Bamboozled the SEC
You can bet that the hedge fund talking points were rolling off the CNBC fax machine last week,…
Upon Further Examination, It Seems My Paper Is Captured Too
No, no newspaperman actually said that. In so many words, anyway. But the following story is true. In…
July 20, 2008
Deep Capture: The Haiku
The tail wags the dog, Then tail eats the dog, then The tail becomes dog. (Wall Street wags…
The SEC Declares Emergency, and Joe Nocera Yammers On
Naked short selling and phantom stock causes the SEC to declare emergency; Joe Nocera and affiliated journalists continue to deny there is a problem.
Gary Weiss: his DTCC ties and lies
We knew Gary Weiss's aim was to discredit and marginalize high profile opponents of illegal naked short selling. Yet his book, which seemed to be the launch pad of Weiss’s campaign, was quite critical of both hedge fund and prime broker culture: the two obvious sides of the naked shorting equation.So who was paying Weiss to spend all day, most every day, publishing his attacks via his blog, message boards, and Wikipedia? Nobody had ever considered the DTCC.