Lousy earnings. It will be interesting to see the Market's reaction tomorrow. Will the short sellers be back in full force? Who is the SEC trying to Kid? The damn short sellers are investment banks who control the SEC.
I think that the new short selling rules are unnecessarily burdensome. Instead, the rule should be (and for every stock). If you fail to deliver, you're forced to cover immediately and have a penalty on top of it (If you profited off the trade, the penalty is at minimum your profits). This leaves it open to the shorter: You can make arrangements to borrow, up front. OR You can go ahead and short if you know you can borrow it. However, if you end up not being able to borrow it, you face big losses.
$9.6 Billion writedown works out to $9.75 a share. Selling off valuable assets. I don't know how the hell MER is in the twenties, much less the high twenties except for its brand name.
That's what I'm saying. Afterhours action barely budged to the downside. Probably all the good money shorting the financials is over at least until we get a huge dead cat bounce.
AH trading doesn't really mean much and moves are usually a bit over exaggerated. I was surprised by the tameness of the market action following the announcements, but I don't know what the whisper number was. But remember Citi will be reporting ahead of the bell tomorrow.... There may be some better action after that.