Paranoia by Destinator BLAH BLAH BLAH ...........I think it is reasonable to speculate that stock market discussion boards were originally created to provide a forum for investors to discuss their favorite stocks. TRUTHFUL information, both positive and negative can be useful to investors that hold shares or are thinking of buying shares in the company being discussed.
Such forums typically provide separate discussion boards for each stock symbol listed in Canada and the USA. I also think it is reasonable to assume that this feature was intended to keep discussions on topic and limited to the company / stock symbol to which it pertains. Unfortunately, that purpose is in the process of being destroyed by some people with hidden agendas.
In a recent interview, published by King World News, Jim Sinclair made the following comment. “There is more reward today for negativity than there is for positivity” (7:25 mark of the interview https://kingworldnews.com/kingworldnews/Broadcast/Entries/2012/4/3_Jim_Sinclair_files/Jim%20Sinclair%204%3A3%3A2012.mp3).
With that in mind, over the years, various participants have embraced this knowledge of human behavior and have begun in earnest to exploit it on the stock market discussion boards.
The amount of negativity on one board that I follow (EXS) became so prevalent that most posters of useful information abandoned the discussion altogether. Eventually the negativity was entirely replaced with a perpetual war between a group of poster ID’s. Today, the vast majority of posts on that board are nothing but a repetitive series of insults between those posters. This exchange has been going on for YEARS. When I continued to post my reasons for being very positive on the stock, I received a long private inbox message that suggested my cheerleading was scaring away investors. Here is a part of that messages:
“Don't get me wrong but you are cheerleading this deal on SH and IHub as if there is a laydown hand of 150 million ounces but as much as I am a bull on EXS, those posts of yours are not helping the price or our credibility. I try to tone down the rah-rah but have elected to keep silent until we see EXS hit the hinge point where a consistency of drill hole data will grab the market's throat.
Until then, try to set a lower bar fro expectations and perhaps some seriously large players will emerge.”
It appears that certain boards, especially those of very promising junior resource companies such as EXS, have become victims of the very instrument that could help them get added publicity; namely the stock market discussion boards. Some, like me and Jim Sinclair feel that - “There is more reward today for negativity than there is for positivity” while others like the one that inboxed me feel that cheerleading for your favorite stock prevents seriously large players from emerging. I still have not figured that one out. Perhaps some readers of this blog can.
Whether it be continual negativity or ridiculous exchanges of insults between users, if you know of any stock discussion forums that you feel are being destroyed in this or any other fashion, and if you are a genuine user with no ulterior motives, you CAN take the discussion boards back with just a little bit of work. Here are some things we can all do.
1.) Write to the administrators of the site telling them that you are unhappy with the lack of moderation on their facility.
2.) If that does not get you the results you need to clean up your board, write to their sponsors and ask them why they bother to consume their advertising budget on a site that consists mainly of insults, attacks and general negativity.
3.) Ask your stock board moderator to publicly display declarations from each poster if they are related to the company in any way. Anyone responding ‘yes’ should not be allowed to post unless they wish to risk saying something that could get their trading privileges revoked.
a. Management
b. Investor Relations
c. Other staff
4.) Ask your stock board moderator to display if a poster has declared themselves to be a financial advisor or broker. Anyone responding ‘yes’ should not be allowed to post unless they wish to risk saying something that could get their trading privileges revoked. If you suspect that a broker is posting on the discussion board of a stock you own or wish to buy, then you should call the compliance department of the company who they work for and tell them why you think they a certain user is one of their brokers. Ask them if their company condones their brokers posting anonymously on stock discussion boards directly or via feeds to other individuals who post on their behalf.
5.) Ask your board moderator to limit one poster ID per IP address. This will make it more difficult for posters with ulterior motives to destroy the quality of discussion on your favorite board.
If you are a sponsor of a discussion forum, I urge you to complain to the board administrators and see what they are doing to clean up the mess made by these people who do nothing but cause real potential customers from visiting the very boards you sponsor.
While I believe it is important for administrators to support the anonymity of posters, I would urge all providers of such forums to display a declaration by each poster of their relationship to the company and to ensure that their boards are kept for what most truthful and honest people would like to participate in – a civil and truthful exchange of information.
P.S. I have been posting for well over 10 years now as Destinator and have been working toward bringing back some sense of order to stock discussion boards. I can’t do it alone but together we can work towards taking them back for the purpose that they were designed. For the record, a couple of years ago, I opened a second ID to see if it would work. It did and it is still active. I look forward to the day when I can no longer use it.
Read more at https://www.stockhouse.com/blogs/viewdetailedpost.aspx?p=128513#bC9TITxuzBW0QLQq.99