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Cash for Keys: Avoid Foreclosure, Pay the Bank Less Than What You Owe… and Get $30,000
U.S. banks have a deal for underwater homeowners: Avoid foreclosure by selling your house for less than what you owe… and they'll pay you $30,000 or more to close the deal. It's called Cash for Keys, and it's working. Banks typically hate short sales because they lose money. The alternative, however, is even more costly […]
The 10 Keys to Short-Selling Profits
Short sellers took a lot of flak for their alleged role in the stock market meltdown of 2008-2009, getting blamed for artificially depressing stock prices, exaggerating the impact of the bad economic news rolling out of Washington and exacerbating the volatility that intensified the financial panic experienced by investors and the general public.
That last allegation was particularly troublesome to market regulators, especially after stock-market researcher Birinyi Associates traced a sudden sharp rise in stock volatility back to mid-July of 2007, a point coinciding with the repeal of the so-called "uptick rule." The uptick rule was a Depression-era regulation that allowed the short sale of a stock only when the prior trade had resulted in an upward move in its price.
That concern over volatility led to a lot of official posturing as the government struggled to come up with solutions to prevent future market mayhem, the result of which (at least for the time being) was the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Feb. 24 adoption of a new "alternative uptick rule."
That last allegation was particularly troublesome to market regulators, especially after stock-market researcher Birinyi Associates traced a sudden sharp rise in stock volatility back to mid-July of 2007, a point coinciding with the repeal of the so-called "uptick rule." The uptick rule was a Depression-era regulation that allowed the short sale of a stock only when the prior trade had resulted in an upward move in its price.
That concern over volatility led to a lot of official posturing as the government struggled to come up with solutions to prevent future market mayhem, the result of which (at least for the time being) was the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Feb. 24 adoption of a new "alternative uptick rule."