Yes, I can see how shorters might make life difficult for you...

Yes, I can see how shorters might make life difficult for you when you are short-term trading.

No, that is not what harymeso is saying at all. He is saying that they are making life difficult for long term investors. A sustained low shareprice operates like a tree shake, scaring investors into selling. He is saying there is an opportunity cost for continuing to hold. (This is why understanding the stock and the science is key. There is a colossal opportunity cost for selling if you don't factor that in).

But for long-term holders of shares, shorters bring about buying opportunities when they get it wrong (and they often do). They therefore help make markets more efficient.

Wait, we should all be happy about price manipulation of a stock because it gives us a buying opportunity?

Explain how shorting only works when they get it wrong? It means they are covering their shorts...and how does that happen? I thought this wasn't happening! You can't have it both ways madamswer.

The shorters therefore help make markets more efficient? An astonishing leap of logic. Markets need to be transparent to be efficient, surely?

What you are saying is, take advantage of the manipulation and make it work for you. Otherwise let's pretend it's not happening.

BTW I'm not responding to your post which demands excessive detail about the lack of regulatory supervision of the market. The points made are clear.

It doesn't take a genius to work out from the variety of examples I have given, that if a regulatory gap exists, the non transparent market will "efficiently" take advantage of it, relieving of the less informed of their confidence in that particular stock, and possibly the market generally. It leads to yet more index hugging, which is bad for companies which are still in the developing stages.

This seems to be the efficiency that you admire.