Thanks for the help , Felicity.

Thank you sir for the Top 10 List!

Every executive running those companies should be investigated for FAILS-TO-DELIVERS caused by NAKED SHORT SELLING of any publicly-traded security. Any entity artificially-suppressing prices of publicly-traded securities should be held accountable if settlement rules are not followed. I believe a forced BUY-IN by each perpetrator of Fails-to-Delivers would be appropriate — and, if more cash is required to fund buy-in’s, a seizure of personal assets of the executives of said companies would be appropriate – considering these executives were paid mega-amounts in salaries and bonuses. Furthermore, punishment including jail time and penalties should be assessed on the companies as well as all executives individually at each company.

Tomorrow, a congressional hearing is scheduled to hear testimony of Hedge Fund Managers regarding their role in the financial crisis. I just wonder…. Will any member of Congress have the courage and guts to ask one of the Hedge Fund Managers if their company was involved in Naked Short Selling (Failing to Deliver borrowed shares in Trade + 3 days) after short-selling during the financial crisis? Or, will Congress just pucker-up and kiss-a$$ as a bunch of shills?

We will find out tomorrow – if just one (1) Congressman asks the right question – and that right question would be a pointed, direct question about the financial damage inflicted by Naked Short Selling.

Considering Dick Fuld, former CEO of Lehman Brothers, testified that Naked Short Selling was one of the reasons for Lehman’s share price fall, I would consider it a big missed-opportunity if not a one single member of the Congress did not ask a pointed question regarding Naked Short Selling.

I hope to see justice in the future.

Hang_’em_High

The entire world of legitimate investors wants to know WHO is financially raping them.

Please list the Top 10 perpetrators of Naked Short Selling.

I hope to see justice in the future.

Hang_’em_High

I can see no reason why a voter would vote NO on that measure.

Circuit City (CC) was financially raped by the Naked Short Sellers in my opinion.

See this website:

http://www.failstodeliver.com

The above website charts the Fails-to-Delivers (FTD’s) and also cites SEC raw data. Note that the SEC doesn’t release “real time” FTD data – but only releases delayed-data (quarterly).

Currently, the average volume of CC is 4,414,490 shares. Note the following FTD’s by date per the website given above:

6/23/08 — 1,242,840 shares FTD;
6/24/08 — 1,001,326 shares FTD.

Just imagine, about 20%+ of the daily shares failed to deliver (if the average daily volume at 6/23/08 & 6/24/08 was 4,414,490 shares).

This is an OUTRAGE. How many of you have ever bought something at Circuit City? When are the regulators going to stop the financial raping via Naked Short Selling? Will this financial crime against investors continually be ignored?

How many more companies will be destroyed by Naked Short Sellers?

How many more lives will be torn apart after the companies they work for are driven out-of-business by Naked Short Sellers?

I challenge everyone that reads this message to DO SOMETHING to stop these evil, financial criminals. I do not know the best course of action. I know the Federal Level is “deeply captured” it seems. So, I am working diligently to convince my State Legislators to write legislation similar to the Ballot Initiative Measure 9 in South Dakota. I could hardly believe that Measure 9 was “defeated” on November 4, 2008. The dark forces won – and the status quo has been maintained in South Dakota. I hope they try AGAIN! The vote was very close, but the dark side narrowly won.

See the verbiage of South Dakota’s proposed Measure 9 at this link:

http://www.voteyes9.com/measure9.php

Folks, I am not an attorney. But, I believe a law in every state with verbiage similar to the above — would put an end to these Naked Short Selling criminals.

I am applying pressure to write such a law in my state. And, I suggest everybody do the same in your respective state. The Naked Short Sellers must be stopped. So, declare war on them — and get the word out! Contact your legislators! Contact Investigative Reporters! If the public knew about this financial destruction of Naked Short Selling, and the destroying of retirement wealth, then they would be up in arms! So, it’s high time to write letters – and make phone calls, etc. The Naked Short Sellers must be stopped.

I hope that I see justice in the future.

Hang_’em_High

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aatlky_cH.tY&refer=worldwide

The coincidence did not escape notice.

http://www.dailypaul.com/node/55223#comment-754909

All is on schedule.

German Report: Deutsche Post CEO faces tax charge
Thu Nov 6, 2:47 pm ET

BERLIN – The former chief executive officer of Germany’s Deutsche Post has been charged with tax evasion, a newspaper reported Thursday.

Klaus Zumwinkel, who resigned his position earlier this year after Bochum prosecutors opened an investigation against him, is accused of avoiding 1.2 million ($1.53 million) euros in taxes according to the charges, the Sueddeutsche Zeitung reported.

Earlier in the day Bochum prosecutor’s spokesman Eduard Gueroff said Zumwinkel would be charged, but he was not available for comment on the evening newspaper report.

A spokesman for Zumwinkel’s attorney could also not immediately be reached.

Zumwinkel is the highest profile suspect in an investigation of tax evasion by German citizens using banks in the tiny tax haven of Liechtenstein.

Tax officials and prosecutors started conducting raids inside Germany in February after the country’s intelligence service paid an informant as much as 5 million ($6.38 million) euros for a CD-ROM containing hundreds of names of people suspected of evading taxes by putting money in foundations in Liechtenstein.

In July, prosecutors said they had already recovered 110 million ($140.47 million) euros in back taxes.

At that time, they said 350 cases were under investigation and authorities are weighing investigations against another 420 people.

The forces against the North Dakota initiative have unlimited resources. I would suspect tampering with the equipment that tallies the votes.

Taxpayers may pay legal bills for mortgage execs
By MATT APUZZO, Associated Press Writer Matt Apuzzo, Associated Press Writer – 1 hr 24 mins ago

WASHINGTON – When the government took over mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, taxpayers inherited more than just bad debts. They’re also potentially on the hook for tens of millions of dollars in legal fees for the executives at the center of the housing market’s collapse.

With the Justice Department investigating companies involved in the mortgage and financial meltdown, executives around the country are hiring defense lawyers. Like many large companies, Fannie and Freddie had contracts promising to cover legal bills for their executives.

When the Treasury Department delivered a $200 billion bailout to Fannie and Freddie, that obligation passed to the government, which may find itself paying for the lawyers defending the executives against the government’s own prosecutors.

“Who’d have thought we might be on the hook for paying the defense costs when we’re also paying the prosecution costs?” said Doug Heller, executive director of Consumer Watchdog, a Santa Monica, Calif.-based group that has been critical of the financial bailout packages. “To defend the economy from the havoc that’s been created, we’re going to defend the havoc creators?”

The Bush administration is working to avoid it. The Federal Housing Finance Agency, which controls Fannie and Freddie, said in regulatory filings that it soon will issue regulations spelling out exactly how such legal fees may be dolled out. The agency could prohibit some fees, but a broad prohibition almost certainly would lead to a costly court fight over who’s responsible for the bills when the Justice Department comes knocking.

Fannie’s and Freddie’s contracts also cover legal fees from shareholder lawsuits. Taxpayers could be forced to pay those legal bills, too. If the shareholders win — if they can prove the companies were mismanaged — the government could be liable for millions of dollars to make up for the executives’ failures.

It wouldn’t be the first time federal money intended to prop up the financial industry was used for unintended purposes. Days after it received an $85 billion federal bailout loan, the huge insurer American International Group Inc. spent $440,000 on an executive retreat with spa treatments, banquets and golf outings.

Both Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have been subpoenaed as part of the wide-ranging Justice Department investigation into the companies’ accounting, disclosure and governance practices. The two companies are key to the U.S. mortgage industry. After banks make loans to home buyers, Fannie and Freddie buy the mortgages from the banks so bankers can have cash on hand to make more loans and keep the economy humming. Fannie and Freddie then bundle those loans and sell them as mortgage-backed securities. The proceeds of those sales help buy more mortgages.

In recent years, however, the companies purchased more risky, subprime mortgages. When the housing bubble burst and the subprime industry imploded, investors feared the risk of buying Fannie and Freddie’s mortgage-backed securities, making it harder for the companies to raise money.

Combined, Fannie and Freddie own or guarantee nearly half of all U.S. mortgages. The Treasury Department stepped in to keep the companies from collapsing and taking the mortgage industry with them.

Neither Fannie nor Freddie has said whether they already have advanced any legal fees to former executives. The companies are required to make general disclosures about such payments but only on quarterly corporate filings.

When the government took over, Fannie Mae chief executive Daniel H. Mudd, Freddie Mac chief executive Richard F. Syron and the rest of the companies’ leadership was dismissed. All those executives would be entitled to have their legal fees covered.

The obligations could easily stretch into millions of dollars. Both companies have promised to pay legal fees for all current and former board members, executives and employees charged or investigated in connection with their employment.

Legal fees can add up quickly. After Freddie Mac restated its earnings in 2003, it became embroiled in several investigations and lawsuits. By the middle of 2005, the company had paid $16.8 million in legal fees for its executives and employees.

Executives who are convicted of wrongdoing are required to give the money back. Those who are acquitted, who are merely witnesses or who are investigated but never charged do not need to reimburse the company.

It’s impossible to determine how much money might be at stake. In taking over the two mortgage giants, the government pledged to spend up to $200 billion to keep both companies afloat. The amount the government actually will spend depends on how well the companies perform in a changing mortgage industry.

With so much money at stake, defense attorneys are watching closely to see how broadly housing regulators restrict any future legal payments. The Fannie and Freddie contracts give the executives the right to sue to force the companies to pay their legal fees. If the executives win, the cost of those lawsuits gets passed to Fannie and Freddie, and potentially to the taxpayers.

Here’s the language of Measure 9:

http://www.voteyes9.com/measure9.php

I wonder why the people of South Dakota voted against Measure 9? At the State Level, I understand that Measure 9 would have required Naked Short Sellers to actually borrow and deliver shares within 3 days. What’s wrong with forcing a “seller” to “deliver” what was sold???

It looks like a clear victory for the Naked Short Sellers. Were the people of South Dakota just ill-informed about the issue? What happened? Do the people of South Dakota not realize that Naked Short Selling is a massive-manipulation of the financial markets, and Measure 9 would have helped to prevent this manipulation?

I am frustrated that the Naked Short Sellers (Financial Rapists) have won yet another victory via the defeat of Measure 9 in South Dakota.

The perpetrators of Naked Short Selling continue to financially-rape investors, as the plunge in the stock market continues.

Any comments as to why South Dakota’s Measure 9 was defeated? Thanks.

I am hoping to see justice one day…

Hang_’em_High

I don’t understand the objection.

Physical Certificates Take a Step Closer to Extinction
by Edward C. Kelleher

Patrick Kirby, DTCC managing director, Asset Services
The Depository Trust Company, (DTC), a DTCC subsidiary, has announced it will no longer issue physical certificates for withdrawals-by-transfer (WTs) for more than 5,500 issues beginning January 1, 2009.
DTC plans to eliminate WTs of physical certificates for all issues that participate in DTC’s Direct Registration System (DRS). Instead, DTC will process these WTs in DRS statement form. This change is pending approval by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). (About 1,550 additional issues are eligible for, but not participating in, DRS and do not offer the investor the opportunity to receive a DRS statement.)
If permitted by an issuer, investors may take their DRS statement to their transfer agent and exchange it for a physical certificate.
Electronic ownership
DTC’s DRS is a book-entry system that enables investors to register their shares electronically with the issuing company or its transfer agents. Instead of a paper certificate, investors receive a statement of their holdings. In 2008, all the major and regional exchanges in the United States mandated that DRS become a listing requirement for all issues. (DTC is the only registered clearing agency operating a DRS.)
“Eliminating the issuance of physical certificates by DTC in withdrawals-by transfer transactions is part of our overall dematerialization effort aimed at eliminating all paper certificates in the securities industry,” said Patrick Kirby, DTCC managing director, Asset Services.
“With the exception of equity securities, virtually all investment instruments in the U.S. including municipal bonds, options and futures and U.S. treasury and agency securities have adopted the book-entry format, helping to eliminate paper and dematerialize the securities industry,” said Kirby.
Paper costs
Both the industry and the government continue to encourage dematerialization. The SEC has recognized that paper certificates are “inefficient” and increase “risk.” According to a 2008 survey by the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association (SIFMA), more than 1.2 million certificates are reported lost, destroyed or stolen annually, costing the industry about $65 million to replace.
Today, there are more than 7,500 issues eligible for DRS and more than 375 of these issues no longer offer the option of a physical certificate. DRS-eligible issues now account for 88% of all WTs submitted to DTC, and more and more investors are choosing book-entry ownership as opposed to physical certificates.
Ready to dematerialize
“DTC’s customers are committed to going paperless,” said Kirby. “In July 2008, for example, more than 44% of all WTs were processed as DRS statements rather than as physical certificates. That compares with just 20% processed as DRS statements a year ago.
Cost is a driving factor in the move to DRS statements. Today, a WT that calls for a physical certificate costs approximately $125 more than a WT in a DRS statement, which costs about $6. In keeping with the plan established by DTCC’s Board of Directors and its Operating Committee, fees for processing physical certificates will continue to increase in coming years.
Non-participating issuers
For issues that are DRS-eligible but not yet participating, DTC plans to eliminate certificate withdrawals for these issues as of July 1, 2009. “We’ll continue to work with these issuers and encourage them to begin participating in DRS, but we’ll also work with the exchanges and regulators to strengthen the exchange listing requirements mandating that listed issues actively participate in DRS,” said Kirby.
For the small number of issues that have not converted by July 1, 2009, WTs will be processed through DTC’s Exception/Rush WT process.
“With these steps, we believe that WT volume should drop to fewer than 150 certificate transactions per day by the second half of 2009. Over time, this will also lead to a sharp drop in deposits of physical certificates. As that decline takes hold, we will move to curtail remaining services that support processing physical securities,” Kirby said. @
Issue Index
August/September 2008

By Sara Hansard
November 2, 2008
http://www.investmentnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20081102/REG/311039962/1027/HEDGEFUNDS

The Securities Industry and Financial Market Association will file a lawsuit against South Dakota if voters there approve a ballot initiative tomorrow that the group claims would effectively ban all short selling.
South Dakota voters will become the first in the nation to vote on whether to ban “naked short selling” — an indication of growing pressure on the hedge fund industry to curb short-selling practices.

Backers of the initiative are looking to bring the matter to a vote in other states as well.

More pressure is coming from NYSE Euronext Inc. of New York, which is citing the concerns of companies listed on both the New York Stock Exchange and the Nasdaq Composite Index to push for a return of the so-called uptick rule.

In order to profit from an expected decline in share prices, short-sellers borrow shares, sell them and then buy the shares back later, hopefully at a lower price. Naked short selling is based on the same principle, except that the seller does not borrow the necessary shares or even ensure that they can be borrowed.

Critics charge that despite regulations against the practice, naked short selling is widespread and threatens companies whose shares are targets of speculators.

The South Dakota initiative is an attempt to duplicate NYSE rules, “but put them into state law so we could have a state law action here in South Dakota,” said Mark Meierhenry, a partner with Sioux Falls, S.D., law firm Meierhenry Sargent LLP. Mr. Meierhenry, who sponsored the initiative, was attorney general of South Dakota from 1979 to 1986.

“We don’t want to have to rely on regulators on Wall Street and courts in New York City because of cost,” he said.

Financial services companies that operate in South Dakota would be required to have a contract to purchase a stock before they shorted it under the initiative, Mr. Meierhenry said.

SIFMA thinks that if the initiative passes, it would effectively ban all short sales, said Travis Larson, a spokesman for the association, which has offices in New York and Washington.

“The ballot has been crafted in such a way as to make illegal any short selling, naked or others, for firms registered to do business in South Dakota, which is every major national firm, almost all the regionals and many others,” he said.

SIFMA would “immediately” take the issue to court to have the initiative overturned if it wins approval, Mr. Larson said.

Mr. Meierhenry denies SIFMA’s contention that the South Dakota initiative would prevent all short sales. A SIFMA lawsuit to have the law overturned would be controversial because it would mean that the association would have to “align themselves with the crooks” in short-selling cases, he said.

In 2006, the Utah legislature repealed a law that would have imposed severe penalties on brokerage firms that failed to deliver stock in short sales after SIFMA won a preliminary injunction in federal court against the state law.

American Entrepreneurs for Securities Reform, based in Union, Mo., plans to offer initiatives similar to the South Dakota initiative in 18 other states that allow voter initiatives on the ballot, said Tim Mooney, a spokesman for the group. AESR is backed by Patrick Byrne, president, chief executive and chairman of Salt Lake City-based Internet retailer Overstock.com Inc., who has been a prominent critic of short-selling practices.

“We’d prefer to do none of this if the SEC would simply enforce the law,” against naked short selling, Mr. Mooney said. More than 4,000 companies, including Overstock.com, have been listed by the SEC as not having their stock delivered on short sales, he said.

These “fails to deliver” are an indication that traders shorted shares without having made the necessary borrowing arrangements.

Scott Cutler: NYSE is not calling for a total ban on short sales, he says. Meanwhile, an Oct. 21 NYSE Euronext survey found that 60% of executives of publicly traded companies polled think that short selling harms their companies’ stock and stockholders. Conducted in mid-October, the stock exchange got responses from 438 executives of companies traded on the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq.
“I don’t think at the New York Stock Exchange we’re advocating a total ban on short selling,” said Scott Cutler, senior vice president of the global corporate client group at NYSE Euronext. “We conducted the study to be clear and give our issuers the opportunity to voice their opinion on the issue.”

WARNING SIGN

But the report could be a warning sign that the powerful exchange will push for more restrictions, some say.
“The nature of the report is a concern,” said Richard Baker, president and chief executive of the Managed Funds Association of Washington, The MFA, which represents hedge funds, is the group associated most with short selling.

The MFA is evaluating the survey findings, Mr. Baker said.

“We do want to formally engage the exchange to have a better understanding about the findings,” he said.

But it isn’t surprising that executives of companies whose stocks may be shorted would want more restrictions on the practice, Mr. Baker said.

Hedge funds and other short-selling traders argue that the two Securities and Exchange Commission emergency orders that banned short sales of financial stocks in September and October didn’t stop market volatility.

According to an Oct. 13 report from Credit Suisse North America of New York, a unit of Credit Suisse Group of Zurich, Switzerland, stocks that were restricted under the SEC ban performed better than the rest of the market prior to the restrictions. The market dropped far more after the restriction was put in place than before, and stocks subject to the short-selling restriction fell along with the rest of the market when the restriction was in place, according to the report.

UPTICK RULE

NYSE Euronext primarily wants the SEC to reinstate the uptick rule, Mr. Cutler said, noting that 85% of the respondents to survey favored that approach.
The rule, which was eliminated by the SEC last year, generally required that short sales be transacted above the price of immediately preceding sales. The rule was intended to reduce market volatility.

“We have attempted to lead the industry to a broader, marketwide solution centered around the reinstitution of the uptick rule,” he said.

Seventy-five percent of the respondents to the NYSE survey said that they want to prohibit short sales when markets are volatile.

“It was pretty clear that corporate issuers, generally speaking, favor rules limiting short selling,” Mr. Cutler said.

“The SEC has tightened its rules regarding short selling and increased liability for those who engage in short selling,” said SEC spokesman John Nester.

SEC Chairman Christopher Cox has said he would be open to a price test for instituting circuit breakers that restrict short selling, but the commission hasn’t received a recommendation from the agency staff yet, Mr. Nester said.

E-mail Sara Hansard at shansard@investmentnews.com.

http://mainstreetamericans.info/

Maybe ethanol is not such a good business after all. Stocks in the sectors were really darlings of the market a year ago. Now oil prices are back down and the price of corn is up, although not as much as it was in mid-summer.

One of the two or three largest ethanol companies in the U.S., Verasun (NYSE: VSE) is filing for Chapter 11. According to The Wall Street Journal, “VeraSun made bad bets on the corn market over the summer as grain prices reached record highs.”

Shares in the firm traded as high as $17.75 late last year. They had dropped to $0.34.

The entire industry may face a restructuring now. It had built a tremendous infrastructure of new plants and shipping facilities assuming that ethanol would be “the next big thing” in the global fuel business. Corn prices moved up because farmers could not produce enough for food and fuel.

The real giant in the industry is ADM (NYSE: ADM). It has moved up from a 52-week low of $13.53 to almost $21.00. The Verasun news could move the shares south again.

Douglas A. McIntyre is an editor at 24/7 Wall St.

Tags: ADM, corn prices, ehtanol, Versun, VSE

I will not post messages on Yahoo again that include the 2 weblinks, but I will not quit talking about the inequities created by the manipulative act of Naked Short Selling.

Wonder why they chose to go after me?

Here’s the precise verbiage of the message that I posted on TWO (2) Yahoo Messageboards in the past few days.

BEGIN QUOTE:

Speaking of the devil, it looks like (insert stock symbol) has had some of that evil Naked Short Selling in the past – evidenced by Fails-to-Delivers. It’s too bad that the Hedge Funds aren’t forced to make public their short positions.

See this website:

http://www.failstodeliver.com/default.aspx

Here’s a link to a Houston law firm specializing in stock fraud and manipulation:

http://www.csj-law.com/attorneys_jchristian.html

END QUOTE.

My conclusion is this — The perpetrators of Naked Short Selling have deeply-captured many forms of “Freedom of Speech” – including Yahoo Messageboard forums. Any comments about this? Anyone else experiencing the same squelching of “Freedom of Speech”?

Abraham Lincoln said the following, I quote:

“Those who deny freedom to others, deserve it not for themselves; and, under a just God, can not long retain it.”

Given: Many readers of this blog know that the effect of Naked Short Selling contributed greatly to the current financial destruction of wealth in the stock markets worldwide.

Solution: To effect changes in the laws, we must fight back PUBLICLY about the inequities of Naked Short Selling — in other public forums other than this very-revealing blog. The public must be informed about what is going on! Le’ts get the word “out” everywhere! Write about it…talk about it…get the word “out”! If Freedom of Speech is inhibited, then don’t give up — keep up the fight!

Hang_’em_High

The DeepCapture presentation indicated that biotechnology was a prime target of naked short attacks. Are there any indications that alternative fuel companies are also more prone to such attacks?

http://blog.yintercept.com

How can this end? Will the USA survive it?