Please do NOT restrict access to public investments to only your preferred group of wealthy individuals. As a non-accredited retail investor it is incredibly frustrating to be denied access to the same investments that other people have access to simply because my portfolio isn't large enough. The proposed regulations only serve to prohibit retail investors such as myself from accessing investments that help us meet our investment and retirement objectives despite not having started out with a trust fund or other multi-generational source of wealth. These restrictions will only serve to further widen the divide between the ultra-wealthy and "everyone else".
Leveraged and inverse products have been an incredibly helpful way for my wife and I to make strategic investments when shorting and other more "traditional" means of taking similar positions in the market simply aren't an option due to having a smaller portfolio. As a result of these products, my wife and I have been able to dramatically grow our portfolio over the years in ways that would have otherwise been impossible for us to access, and with the added benefit of not being forced into taking on margin loans, paying interest on our investments, and subjecting ourselves to potential margin calls we would be unable to meet (and thus would have destroyed us financially). These inverse and leveraged products allow us to control just how much of our portfolio is at risk by using them instead of forcing us to risk our entire investment portfolio as this proposed regulation would have us do.
Ultimately, investors must themselves be responsible for their chosen investments, and must be allowed to shoulder the accountability for their own investing decisions. These are private and personal decisions, and as such they are NOT decisions that are appropriate to be made at a government level, let alone simply based on how wealthy someone is. Regulations such as these are so badly conceived that they effectively hold as truth that famous celebrities with no clue about financial markets are immenently more qualified to choose investments than a top Wharton graduate who happens to have a low net worth.
The plain truth of the matter is that if an "investor" chooses not to invest but to instead gamble by purchasing instruments which they do not understand, they deserve whatever results those decisions may bring (be them good or bad). It is reprehensible that a government agency is seeking to prevent responsible individuals from exercising their ability to access free markets in the name of "protecting" people who aren't in the least concerned with protecting themselves.
Ultimately, these types of regulations make it abundantly clear that you are not at all interested in "protecting" anyone other than the wealthy elite by denying smaller retail investors equal investing opportunities.
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William Lowey Comment On Regulatory Notice 22-08
To whom it may concern,
Please do NOT restrict access to public investments to only your preferred group of wealthy individuals. As a non-accredited retail investor it is incredibly frustrating to be denied access to the same investments that other people have access to simply because my portfolio isn't large enough. The proposed regulations only serve to prohibit retail investors such as myself from accessing investments that help us meet our investment and retirement objectives despite not having started out with a trust fund or other multi-generational source of wealth. These restrictions will only serve to further widen the divide between the ultra-wealthy and "everyone else".
Leveraged and inverse products have been an incredibly helpful way for my wife and I to make strategic investments when shorting and other more "traditional" means of taking similar positions in the market simply aren't an option due to having a smaller portfolio. As a result of these products, my wife and I have been able to dramatically grow our portfolio over the years in ways that would have otherwise been impossible for us to access, and with the added benefit of not being forced into taking on margin loans, paying interest on our investments, and subjecting ourselves to potential margin calls we would be unable to meet (and thus would have destroyed us financially). These inverse and leveraged products allow us to control just how much of our portfolio is at risk by using them instead of forcing us to risk our entire investment portfolio as this proposed regulation would have us do.
Ultimately, investors must themselves be responsible for their chosen investments, and must be allowed to shoulder the accountability for their own investing decisions. These are private and personal decisions, and as such they are NOT decisions that are appropriate to be made at a government level, let alone simply based on how wealthy someone is. Regulations such as these are so badly conceived that they effectively hold as truth that famous celebrities with no clue about financial markets are immenently more qualified to choose investments than a top Wharton graduate who happens to have a low net worth.
The plain truth of the matter is that if an "investor" chooses not to invest but to instead gamble by purchasing instruments which they do not understand, they deserve whatever results those decisions may bring (be them good or bad). It is reprehensible that a government agency is seeking to prevent responsible individuals from exercising their ability to access free markets in the name of "protecting" people who aren't in the least concerned with protecting themselves.
Ultimately, these types of regulations make it abundantly clear that you are not at all interested in "protecting" anyone other than the wealthy elite by denying smaller retail investors equal investing opportunities.