Why do you and I use made up names on HC? In my case I want to...

Why do you and I use made up names on HC? In my case I want to remain anonymous. Do you know anyone on here who is disclosing all of their details let alone how many shares they hold. There are lots of reasons why individuals keep their identities secret not all of which involve criminal or civil conspiracies.

I remember quite a few years ago an academic couple in New York, I think in their eighties, passed away after long and distinguished careers working for the one university lecturing in the humanities. After their deaths it was discovered that they had been incredibly successful long term share market investors and had died with an estate in the several hundreds of millions of dollars. Their broker was the only one who knew about their trading activities and gave the explanation that they valued their privacy.

Warren Buffet has said that the greatest impediment to his making more money was being Warren Buffet because the minute he took a position (or thought about taking a position) the share price would go up. Not suggesting one of these investors is Warren Buffet but notoriety has its downside.

When the top twenty list comes out we may know who they are but then again they may be like many sophisticated investors and use trusts and investment holding companies to maintain their privacy.

If you look at the current list of top twenty share holders for example you will find Citicorp Nominees Pty Ltd with 14,362,394 shares, J P Morgan Nominees Australia Limited with 7,237,476 shares, BNP Paribas Nominees Pty Ltd<IB AU Noms RetailClient with 4,806,770 shares and HSBC Custody Nominees (Australia) Limited with 9,237,403 shares not to mention Merrill Lynch (Australia) Nominees Pty Limited with 99,523,611 shares.

There would not be many ASX listed companies though you are welcome to look where the name and address of every shareholder is available to every retail investor.

Having said this I agree it would be nice to know who but my knowing serves my interest and naturally enough they only care about their interest just like me.