Short selling curbs to be delayed?

What to make of short selling curbs? Not too long ago, it seemed liked new curbs would be passed this year, a response to the short selling that sparked so much outrage from companies like Morgan Stanley and Lehman Brothers. But now that the meat of the crisis has been digested, I'm not so sure they will be passed.

The SEC has pledged to impose new rules by the end of the year. But what rules? The SEC proposed five possibilities earlier this year and asked for comment by June 19. According to Bloomberg, the SEC might re-open the public comment period, adding to the 5,000 comments that streamed in.

Part of the problem is that there's little evidence about how various proposals actually would work. But it stands to reason that some sort of curb, if not an outright ban, would make sense if the market moved downward by a certain percentage. Still, the issues are complex, and the agency wants to get it right, but the urgency has faded. That could lead to better policy.

For more:
- here's the article

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