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Comment by baybal2 | Hacker News Reader

> I'm amazed the world isn't taking more action on China. Its quite sad really, 20 years ago, any one of the headlines from this year would have prompted sanctions and denunciations...

Why would world politicians take any actions against China when so many of them do have a finger in the honeypot themselves?

Invalidate stock shares* of all companies who made untold billions on China, and you will see that a huge double digit of Western politicians will go broke overnight.

The one sole reason the West was so eager to jump on the China train unlike any other broke harebrained communist country was because China went from the start to openly bribing Western elites.

The reason why China is not Iraq now is that.

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> The reason why China is not Iraq now is that.

And nuclear weapons. Don't forget the elephant in the room. China has nukes, which severely limits the pressure the West can put on it.

And having 1bn people. We couldn't control Iraq or Afghanistans populations (both sub 40mil). Try a job 35 times bigger...

What would “invalidating stocks” even mean?

Here, invalidate stock shares

Yeah, but what does it mean? To revoke ownership of the company from its owners? Who then gets to own the company and why?

Or does it mean the company should cease to exist, and all employees should be fired immediately? We should deny honest people from getting their salaries?

To declare their shares of having no more legal power than toilet paper.

But owning shares mean owning a part of a company? Does that mean that when a company’s shares are invalidated, then the company is now worth zero, and anybody can buy it for a penny? Are the owners forced to sell everything for a penny, or they are allowed to choose, when to sell and at what price?

Why would the price be different from current stock price?

One way, or another, whomever owned the company through shares gets his wallet lightened by the amount of shares gone.

They will think twice before bidding on something this underhanded again.

> But owning shares mean owning a part of a company? Does that mean that when a company’s shares are invalidated, then the company is now worth zero, and anybody can buy it for a penny? Are the owners forced to sell everything for a penny, or they are allowed to choose, when to sell and at what price?

In real life, bankruptcy usually ends up essentially invalidating the shares of a company. Depending on the method of bankruptcy, the company continues to exist, but the owners of the existing shares loose any claim to anything. If "invalidate stock shares" of a public company became some kind of sanction for improper behavior, it would probably be coupled with some kind of process to transfer ownership?

Invalidating all shares in a company without further process to reallocate ownership is an interesting hypothetical. I suppose the organization would become something like abandoned property and escheat to the government.

If you delist a company in country B, you stop all investment in that company, and you create a chilling effect on future investment.

No change in company ownership.

Business carries on in country A. People can get new jobs.

> The one sole reason the West was so eager to jump on the China train unlike any other broke harebrained communist country was because China went from the start to openly bribing Western elites.

This is very accurate. Recent example is the implied Biden family in CCP's pocket [1][2].

[1] Prof. Di Dongsheng's national televised speech that has since been taken down: https://youtu.be/aeegrkPx0xE [2] https://www.thestandard.com.hk/breaking-news/section/6/16084...

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