The Uptick Rule's Long Goodbye Gets Longer

The announcement gave few details, except that it now appears that these systems changes will be more extensive, costly and time-consuming than had been anticipated during the comment period for the new regulation authorizing the program.

The SEC chose stocks for the program by working from the Russell 3000 index. The SEC excluded the first 32 securities in that index that are listed neither on the Nasdaq nor on the American or New York stock exchanges. Then it excluded issuers whose initial public offerings commenced after April 30, 2004. Of the remaining stocks on the index, the SEC divided them into three groups, by the exchange on which they were listed, and ranked those in each group by the average daily dollar volume over the last year. Finally, it selected every third stock from the remaining groups.

The resulting list consists of 50% NYSE listed securities, 2.2% Amex listed securities and 47.8% Nasdaq NNM securities.

Contact Bob Keane with questions or comments at: [email protected].