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wtf? Do they even have the power to do this? What are they going to do, exactly? Stop all margin trades?

Also banned in the UK. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122177732212354285.html

It's a ban on about 900 stocks, mainly financial. The action ends Oct 2nd, unless they extend.

It's about shutting up the short sellers, not short selling in and of itself. People with big short stakes have been the ones going through the books and screaming on conference calls and to the media that various companies are toxic. Smart people have made billions in recent months. The government wants to shut them up so it has more time to triage.

But if what those big mouths like Einhorn/Eckman say is true (which it is), wouldn' that be to the benefit of the shareholders? These big mouths have alerted the shareholders of the innate problems in MBI and Lehman months before they capitulate.

Those crashes you've seen lately, I would argue, are the works of an efficient market. Isn't it prescient that the market drove down the price of AIG to near the fair value after the bailout ($2-5), well before it was actually bailed out?

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