Concerning SEC's use of trading suspensions in connection with stocks whose information is inaccurate or inadequate in SEC's opinion, the following SI posts may be of interest: #reply-3340993, #reply-3492231.
In connection with the duration of the trading halt, there is good news and bad news. The SEC can not extend the halt. However, they can institute a new halt based on new reasons (see #reply-3813172 for more details). However, the real impediment to trading as usual comes from the need for market makers to comply with 15c2-11. In practice, this appears to mean the company must generate new financials which satisfy at least one market maker and the NASD (and possibly the SEC (at least informally) as well - though they aren't officially in the approval chain) before market makers can introduce bid/ask quotes on the stock. In the past, this has often meant the company never traded again or it traded on the Pink Sheets. However, there has been a recent development in the three most recently halted stocks before SLUP. These were International Heritage (IHIN), Electro-Optical Systems (EOSC) and Shopping.com (IBUY). In all three cases, the requirements of 15c2-11 were not satisfied immediately after the end of the trading halt. However, all three traded in a post-halt grey market (see #reply-4204269 for an explanation). Such grey market trading tends to be very volatile:
news-observer.com
news-observer.com
ocregister.com
Next concerning the SEC's inability to obtain information on the SLUP contract from China, the following 1994 Senate testimony of Michael Mann (SEC Director of International Affairs) may be of interest:
"With the increase in international securities trading, the
information the SEC needs to enforce the U.S. securities laws is
often outside the United States. The SEC has found that cooperation
with foreign securities authorities, rather than unilateral action,
is generally the best way to obtain information abroad. The SEC has
also found that it is useful to formalize its relationships with
foreign securities authorities in memoranda of understanding
("MOUs"). The SEC now has MOUs with many of its major foreign
counterparts, including those in Canada, France, Italy, Japan,
Mexico and the United Kingdom. The SEC continues to negotiate and
enter into new MOUs, including a recent understanding with the
securities regulator in China."
Here's the link to the testimony (Warning - It's long. To find Mann's testimony use your browser's find function to locate the third occurrence of 'mann' in the document):
gwjapan.org
It is, of course, possible that the MOU with China does not cover this situation. Still the existence of the MOU appears to raise a question. |
