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Comment by TAForObvReasons | Hacker News Reader

For those commenting that shareholders should sell, FB is in the S&P 500. In standard 401K and other accounts, there is no way to own an S&P499 product that has no exposure to FB. Many of us are indirect shareholders and don't really have a compelling alternative

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Most people don't manage their retirement funds for good reason, but if you wanted to...

The S&P500 has roughly 11 sectors to it. Each one with its own ETF options. Each one of those sectors is also broken down by industry.

So in Facebook's case, you could get an ETF for the 10 sectors besides "Communication Services". Communication Services has less than 30 stocks. You could get an ETF for specific industries within Communication Services or just pick some of those stocks you like the most to add to your portfolio. Facebook's industry has only 4 other stocks I believe - Google (2), Twitter & TripAdvisor.

Of course the main downside to managing your own portfolio is re-balancing it.

But this is something I've considered from time to time when I feel very bearish on a certain company or industry that I feel my automated portfolio is overweight on.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_S%26P_500_companies

So, what control do you have over the other 499 stocks?

What is really needed there then is an index that excludes companies which don't have relatively open governance structures.

You could short FB.

You cannot short any stock from most retirement funds

EDIT: for those downvoting, please point to a retirement vehicle that does support shorting

I didn't downvote but the closest I know you could do to this is buy an inverse ETF that is heavy in Facebook. I don't think there are any inverse ETFs that would even have more than 10% Facebook.

Complaining multiple times about being downvoted tends to add to more downvotes.

True, but you can short the stock from elsewhere in your portfolio (i.e., just a standard nonretirement account), and it's economically equivalent (modulo some stuff with taxes).

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