The fourth proposal

(Oh how this wish they could...-AM)

Mon Apr 6, 2009 9:03pm EDT

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. securities regulators will consider about 4 proposals to restrict short selling, a type of investing blamed for accelerating the severe downturn in financial services stocks.

Proposals the SEC will consider at its Wednesday meeting include the restoration of the "uptick rule," which allowed short sales -- a bet that a stock's price will fall -- only when the last sale price was higher than the previous price, the chief of the Securities and Exchange Commission said on Monday.

"We are going to put forward about four different proposals, and one of them does include the original (uptick rule)," SEC Chairwoman Mary Schapiro told reporters on the sidelines of the Council of Institutional Investors conference. "There are different modified versions because the markets have changed a lot, even since 2007."

Schapiro said other proposals on the table include a so-called "bid test" and a "circuit breaker."

Schapiro did not provide details on how the bid test or circuit breaker could work and did not elaborate on the fourth proposal.