A Stitch in Haste

A man teeming with God’s Love wants to express it in the same way Jesus would — on the stock market:

A pastor who threatened a national boycott against Microsoft and other major corporations for endorsing a gay rights bill urged supporters Tuesday to buy up the companies’ stock and dump it to drive prices down.

Rev. Ken Hutcherson, pastor of Antioch Bible Church in the Seattle suburb of Redmond, said the stock-dumping plan had been part of his strategy all along.
…
He wants supporters to buy one or two shares over the next few months, then sell them May 1.

I think it would be a wonderful idea for Bigot Reverend Hutcherson to try this. I really hope he goes ahead with this plan…

…because pump-and-dump is illegal:

It shall be unlawful for any person, directly or indirectly … To effect, alone or with one or more other persons, a series of transactions in any security … with respect to such security creating actual or apparent active trading in such security, or raising or depressing the price of such security, for the purpose of inducing the purchase or sale of such security by others.

Of course, this section of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 is not intended to apply to idiots like Bigot Reverend Hutcherson, but to so-called “boiler rooms” that might — unlike Bigot Reverend Hutcherson — actually achieve something nefarious. Still, I’d love to see a gay advocacy group file a class action against Hutcherson the day after the dump (the 1934 Act allows for private lawsuits as well as criminal prosecution). That would be fun, especially when Hutcherson’s defense would likely be “we had no impact on the market.” Heh.

On the other hand, Bigot Reverend Hutcherson could try a different tactic, one that many agitators try — shareholder votes. Back when I used to own Philip Morris Altria stock, I remember that there was some gaggle of nuns who owned I think exactly one share of stock and every year put a shareholder referendum on the ballot calling for Philip Morris to, um, stop selling tobacco. You can imagine how such votes play out each year. Heh.

Also, no word yet on whether Bigot Reverend Hutcherson will also try to smite Microsoft for its true sins rather for the faux sin of not hating gays.

Meanwhile, here are some fun facts about Microsoft:

–shares outstanding: 10.9 billion
–average daily trading volume: 6.6 million shares
–market capitalization: $288 billion
–annual revenue: $39.8 billion
–special one-time dividend paid December 2004: $32 billion

Good luck trying to pump-and-dump that.

More thoughts at Good As You.

(Cross-posted at Spectrum Bloggers.)