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US did that too

Trivial says

US did that too

No, the US banned naked short-selling.

If I recall correctly the US banned short selling of financials. In any event this will not help the situation in Europe. Banning short selling (not taking about naked shorts) just sends a message to the market something is terribly wrong.

DrPepper says

If I recall correctly the US banned short selling of financials.

Yes, the SEC did ban short-selling of financial companies for 15 days back in September 2008. At the time, the concern was that manipulation of the market was going on. This ban sounded further reaching, but on further investigation, it looks like it might also be a 15-day ban on shorting financials. If there is a ton of manipulation going on right now, it might be the right move again -- this is very fact-sensitive.

Is it a bad sign? Maybe, but it can also prevent a panic based on false information.

Good, it should help stabilize things. Sadly, it will never happen here in the United Corporate States.

I don't agree that it will stabilize things. Time will tell but I think we should expect another bailout or a failure of a major European bank sooner than later.

I dunno, it's strange. Asia up, Europe seems OK.

Futures here however still show down.

The short selling ban in the US is not too far behind. Especially on financial stocks. Watch them get shorted like hell today (ahead of any bans).