War on Speculators: Restricting Short Sales on Sovereign Debt and Equities

How does government resolve the problem of their profligacy? Well, blame the speculators (a.k.a. markets)!

From the Wall Street Journal

European Union finance ministers Tuesday reached an agreement on rules limiting short-selling of shares and sovereign debt, overcoming concern from the U.K. that the legislation will give the EU's new securities regulator too much power.

The ministers must now negotiate a final version of the legislation with lawmakers at the European Parliament, which favors broader rules that would also cover short sales of credit default swaps linked to sovereign debt.

France and Germany in particular have blamed short-selling of sovereign debt for having exacerbated the euro-zone debt crisis, though regulators say there is little evidence that trading activity has caused the yields of Greek, Irish and Portuguese bonds to soar in the past year.

These has been a continuing motion to pass the blame on everyone else in what truly represents as the unintended adverse consequences of past policies.