I've heard this theory multiple times: that prior to 9/11 there was a lot of "shorting" of airline stock. In case you don't know, "shorting" means you borrow the stock and sell it with the promise you'll bring it back to the original owner. You are betting the stock will drop.
Of all the conspiracy theories I've heard about 9/11, this one seems the easiest to verify or debunk, since every day zillions of bits of data are printed regarding the stock market's every twitch.
So... does anyone know if anyone has looked into this? If so, please provide a link.
The theory goes that someone made a ton of money, but still hasn't picked it up yet.
Please let me know if you have a link to someone who has actually looked at the data.
2007-06-18 03:12:45 · 12 answers · asked by Silent Kninja 4 in Business & Finance ➔ Investing
I provide a link of someone's study below, but I just want to start with the caveat that I looked at this a little bit myself back at the time. The difficulty was that airlines and some related industries were rolling over before 9/11 happened, making it harder to disentangle potentially nefarious activity from normal trading.
Anyway, what I have for you is an investigation of put options being bought pre-9/11, with some promising evidence of some informed trades being made. (Call and put options make it easier to put on a large directional bet without tying up so much capital.)
http://www.business.uiuc.edu/poteshma/research/poteshman2006.pdf
The paper has links to other articles (with mostly circumstantial evidence).
Hope this helps!
2007-06-18 03:50:01 · answer #1 · answered by Global_Investor 3 · 0⤊ 1⤋
1
2016-12-23 21:19:40 · answer #2 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
This has been investigated at length by the SEC and it's been determined that, although there was some shorting of airline stocks just prior to 9/11, there is no indication that anything was done with pre-knowledge.
What you are missing is, the market was on it's way down into the toilet when the planes flew into the WTC... and WHAT do you DO when you are trading a sinking market?... why.. you go SHORT...
If that event had not happened, the market would have trashed itself in another 4 or 5 months anyway... The SEC issued a report on this and the conclusion was, the events of 9/11 merely hurried up something that was going to happen naturally.
I still have the data on the 250 stocks I was tracking on 9/10/01 and, no matter how I look at that data, I come to the same conclusion the SEC came too.
2007-06-18 03:22:00 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 3⤊ 2⤋
There is lots of evidence some investors were shorting airline stocks just before 9/11, it is all public record. It is also public record that there was no volume of short positions any larger than one might anticipate given all the technical indicators of those stocks on 9/10.
2007-06-18 03:32:05 · answer #4 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 1⤋
Put Options 9 11
2016-10-16 05:31:11 · answer #5 · answered by banegas 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
It has been looked into exhaustively. It is an obvious follow-up.
Not just shorting Airline Stock. Jet fuel was impacted, the price of oil went up. The price of all commodities went up, the stock market took a major tumble that took until this year to fully recover. Investments in all of these areas were/are being looked into.
The SEC investigates these links on a regular basis
2007-06-18 03:18:18 · answer #6 · answered by mark 7 · 0⤊ 2⤋
There are a lot of interesting events mentioned at this website.
http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/timeline.jsp?timeline=complete_911_timeline&before_9/11=insiderTrading
They are too numerous to copy and paste but the shorting of stock on the insurance companies for the airlines and the world trade center itself is quite curious.
2007-06-18 03:51:32 · answer #7 · answered by jt66250 7 · 0⤊ 2⤋
I'd file this theory right along woth all the rest of those nut case theories about 9/11 being a conspiracy that have involved half of the population of the planet in one way or another. In the trash.
If they did make a ton of money it could easily be traced. FTC requires records of every transaction make concerning stocks and bonds.
2007-06-18 04:46:19 · answer #8 · answered by namsaev 6 · 0⤊ 2⤋
If there was a lot shorting, it is possible it was just due to rising gas prices. It is certainly possible the terrorists shorted the stocks though.
2007-06-18 03:20:37 · answer #9 · answered by Freethinker 6 · 0⤊ 1⤋
You mean someone would actually maintain a link disproving conspiracy only to have it buried in the tons of stupid conspiracy theories? Much as people hate Muslim's, it might do some good to recognize the actual conspiracy - a bunch of people with college educations made a plan to steal flying bombs and it worked even better than they planned.
2007-06-18 03:17:19 · answer #10 · answered by Mike1942f 7 · 0⤊ 2⤋