There was a thread yesterday about Jim Cramer and Gamestop (GME) stock.
Although I disagreed with just about everyone in that thread, it did cause me to do a little digging.
I found this lecture by Patrick Byrne. He explains how Goldman Sachs creates FAKE shares of stock that do not exist, and this is how their company is so profitable.
The problem is, it has caused massive leverage in the system, and could be one of the reasons for a stock market crash (the money printing by the Federal Reserve is the other reason).
Goldman Sachs and the other prime brokers are THE SOURCE of ALL fake shares in the marketplace (and basically, all the fuckery in the marketplace).
The part where he explains HOW they create the fake shares is about 10 minutes of the presentation, and starts at about 3:00 (then, he goes on to talk about how to solve the problem with blockchain):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=COQvMsbb-Cw
- Almost 100% of the profits of Goldman Sachs comes from their "Securities Lending" operation
- That operation is focused mostly on "hard to borrow shares"
- They identify stocks that people want to short, then they lend those shares out
- They do NOT have to actually own the stock when they lend it out
- This allows GS to lend out shares that do not exist
- Since they are also a prime broker, most of this lending is necessarily to hedge funds, which are the investors who are shorting stock that does not exist
Goldman Sachs and the other 5 prime brokers are the SOURCE of all the fake shares out there.
This is EXACTLY the same as the "money changers" from centuries ago, when they created more money certificates than were actually backed by gold on deposit. Same exact scam, just with stock instead of gold.
It is always good to know the names of the criminals to prosecute. Now, it's just a matter of finding the prosecutors and getting them into office.
I remember the DD about this being way bigger than most think. That Citadel has been in cahoots with Bezos and Bain Capital (Romney’s outfit) and has naked shorted competitors for the last 2 decades into the ground or rather cellar in this case. Naked shorting is illegal because creates fake shares like described by OP. But with these past shorted bankrupted companies like Sears toys r us and others they shorted it but never closed their trades. They use this to not ever pay taxes either. If shares is worth close to zero they can keep on books as a short and they can collaterize for keeping their gains but never have to pay taxes on it. Theory is that it is similar to fencing stolen cars in that they naked short (illegal) these companies into the cellar close to zero stock price. These companies are bankrupted and Bain capital is used as the “chop shop” for liquidating the physical assets