I'm less and less confident that they (gov't, banks, wall street, etc.) will let it get to that kind of thing. What prevents half the shares being sold, bought, resold, etc until the shorts are covered? I imagine at some point there would be a bailout before an infinity pool would be allowed. I'm not aware of any other precedent that would justify it. There's a long precedent of gov't bailing out stuff.. GM, etc.