Rogue trader crackdown: How the City players have reacted
The regime has safeguards built in to prevent the FSA introducing new rules without consultation, yet they do this overnight. I hope it will be challenged in the courts."
The fund manager: M&G said: "We are a long-only investor but short-selling has always been a bit of a spectre over the market that is not fully understood. Clarity in markets is a good thing."
The spread better: David Jones, chief market strategist at IG Index, asked: "Do free markets apply only on the upside now? Short-sellers really only hit stocks that were already on the way down. They don't create share-price falls out of nothing."
The short-seller: Simon Cawkwell, a short-selling professional dubbed Evil Knievil: "It takes someone as silly as the FSA to imagine this is an area of abuse. As a bear, I'm attracted to the honeypot and I don't see how the honeypot has changed."
The analyst: Will Duff Gordon at Data Explorers: "They have pushed this out at very short notice with apparently little or no consultation. I doubt it is the right sort of medicine to deal with the cold."
The stockbroker: Richard Hunter, head of equities at Hargreaves Lansdown: "When shares fall below the call price, maybe that's getting into the realm of market manipulation. But they shouldn't ban short-selling outright. It's a legitimate hedging strategy."
The rogue trader: An anonymous trader: "It won't make any difference to what I do, it's just a bit more admin work. If I wanted to take a short position and not disclose it, I'd get around it easy enough anyway. The FSA doesn't understand the market."
