Santa Ana-based real estate brokerage and investor Grubb & Ellis Co. on Friday was added to the New York Stock Exchange’s recently created short-selling ban list.
The list was started last week by the Securities and Exchange Commission as an attempt to crack down on short selling of financial companies amid the ongoing economic crisis.
More than 900 companies listed on NYSE and Nasdaq have been added to the list.
Grubb & Ellis, which counts a market value of about $200 million, appears to have been added for its raising of money to invest in office and other buildings, rather than for its commercial real estate brokerage business.
Along with banks, the list is designed to protect savings associations, brokers, dealers and insurance companies from seeing big swings in their stock price because of short sellers.
Short sellers borrow shares of a company on the expectation that its stock price will fall. If the price declines, they repurchase the shares, return them and keep the profit.
Other local companies on the list include Newport Beach-based Downey Financial Corp. and Santa Ana-based First American Corp.
