Today I start a series of articles on Naked Short Selling. I hosted a lunch of our local CFA Society and Mr. Byrne was our guest. He gave a very illuminating speech on the practice of Naked Short Selling and its impact on the financial markets. I want to share the information with you.
Today I will introduce Mr. Patrick M. Byrne. In subsequent articles I will introduce what Naked Short Selling is, I will describe its impact on a company and on investors and I will give case example illustrating the points. I am informed that Bloomberg and Forbes have in-depth articles on this in print and on the way.
Patrick M. Byrne is by education and temperament a philosopher. He has a BA from Dartmouth College in Asian Studies and Philosophy, a master's degree in philosophy from Cambridge University as a Marshall scholar, and a Ph.D in philosophy from Stanford University. In my judgment he learned the lessons of critical thinking well.
Mr. Byrne has served as chairman, president and CEO of three companies, Centricut, LLC, Fechheimer Brothers, Inc., and Utah based Overstock.com which he also founded. His business formation was as an equity value analyst. I believe his analytical, motivational and management skills are formidable.
While not usual for a biography I think it is important to note that Mr. Byrne seems to be a moral and compassionate man. He rode a bicycle across the USA for a fourth time to raise money and awareness for cancer research at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute. He began Worldstock.com as a division of Overstock.com. Worldstock.com sells the production of third world and local underprivileged artisans online. This method cuts out several middlemen and results in the artisans receiving 60% to 70% of the final sales price, a number much higher than their traditional distribution methods. And he seems to find the illegal and unethical practices of some current funds and brokers abhorrent.
On a personal note Mr. Byrne has earned a black belt in tae kwon do and at one time pursued a career as a professional boxer. He is an excellent and entertaining speaker. I was pleased to meet him yesterday.
Larry,
Thank you for your kind words. I enjoyed the opportunity.
The person writing you is likely not putting you on, but is instead, trying to fill the first page of comments with meaningless blather so no real converation will start. It is a technique the bad guys use all over the message boards.
Regards,
Patrick
Posted by: Patrick Byrne | October 14, 2006 3:13 PM | Permalink to Comment