SEC to Drop "Uptick" Rule

The SEC has announced that it will propose rules to repeal the "uptick" rule on short selling.  The rule allows traditional short selling only after positive (or neutral) price moves.  A pilot program, suspending the rule for some stocks, has been in place since 2005 and shown no ill effects on stock prices.  The rules is a depression era hold-over (based more on fear than reason) and has always been ill-advised.  Now if the SEC will also ferret out other short selling prohibitions, such as those that affect mutual funds, absolute trading strategies, if free of fraud, will once again be unregulated.