I get the impression that your are conflating two different concepts.
There is the concept of naked short selling, as it related to shorting something such as a stock option without also being short the underlying stock. That is legal, but often considered risky.
Then, there is the concept of naked short selling a stock, where there are NO SHARES AVAILABLE to short. If you want to short, your broker is supposed to LOCATE the shares to short. If he can't, then he is not supposed to allow the trade to take place.
This explains it:
Naked shorting is the illegal practice of short selling shares that have not been affirmatively determined to exist.
The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) banned the practice of naked short selling in the United States in 2008 after the financial crisis. The ban applies to naked shorting only and not to other short-selling activities.
Prior to this ban, the SEC amended Regulation SHO to limit possibilities for naked shorting by removing loopholes that existed for some brokers and dealers in 2007. Regulation SHO requires lists to be published that track stocks with unusually high trends in failing to deliver (FTD) shares.
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/n/nakedshorting.asp
There is only ONE way that naked short selling of an individual stock can happen: one or more brokerages and/or investment bankers are allowing short positions to be put on, without FIRST locating and identifying specific stocks to be borrowed for the short position. It is illegal.
This is the same basic principle as the goldsmith who has a certain amount of gold in the vault, but issues more than that amount as "money certificates of gold." The gold does not exist, which makes it fraudulent.
Here, the shares of stock do not exist, which makes it fraudulent, and was made illegal in 2008.
The BIG question is: Why does Kelly Loeffler's husband allow this illegal activity to take place on the NYSE?
I get the impression that your are conflating two different concepts.
There is the concept of naked short selling, as it related to shorting something such as a stock option without also being short the underlying stock. That is legal, but often considered risky.
Then, there is the concept of naked short selling a stock, where there are NO SHARES AVAILABLE to short. If you want to short, your broker is supposed to LOCATE the shares to short. If he can't, then he is not supposed to allow the trade to take place.
This explains it:
Naked shorting is the illegal practice of short selling shares that have not been affirmatively determined to exist.
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/n/nakedshorting.asp
There is only ONE way that naked short selling of an individual stock can happen: one or more brokerages and/or investment bankers are allowing short positions to be put on, without FIRST locating and identifying specific stocks to be borrowed for the short position. It is illegal.
This is the same basic principle as the goldsmith who has a certain amount of gold in the vault, but issues more than that amount as "money certificates of gold." The gold does not exist, which makes it fraudulent.
Here, the shares of stock do not exist, which makes it fraudulent, and was made illegal in 2008.
The BIG question is: Why does Kelly Loeffler's husband allow this illegal activity to take place on the NYSE?