To an inexperienced trader who lacks any knowledge of the way in which the financial markets function, the act of short selling a company can often appear as unethical and barbaric. This is an understandable opinion. After all, you are essentially betting on a company to fail with your position, and losing money if they gain value by having to buy a short position back at a loss.

It’s unfortunate then that most German stocks are traded in the U.S., which means the banning of short selling this past May will likely affect the German stock market very little. It may slow the decline of prices on eurozone stocks for the coming years by a small, marginal bit, but it really won’t cause any significant shielding against the coming storm.

And historically, it’s proven true. There are numerous examples of strong companies that have survived significant short selling and continued to prosper, and other companies that have not. Either way, short selling just means the burden of exiting will be placed on the shareholders rather than the short sellers, who will fill in the blanks on a bad trade and exit if the bias on the stock changes significantly enough.