Quote from Mainstar’s Letter to Clients
“During a recent review of the Direct Registration System (DRS) process, Mainstar determined we will no longer be able to hold investments in a DRS position due to limitations from the transfer agent regarding communication, reporting and reconciliation of the account.
As of June 20, 2023, Mainstar will no longer process requests to DRS shares of an investment. Any investments currently held in a DRS position will be moved to Mainstar’s Depository Trust Clearing Corp (DTCC) account. This will ensure Mainstar is timely able to trade, settle, and reconcile positions.”
The first post about this with a picture of the letter I was able to find is:
While at first this was a trust me bro post, I know several other Mainstar clients personally and can confirm as of this afternoon that they have received the letter as well. Here's an image supplied by one of them.
https://i.imgur.com/TMxDqiD.png
How many GME shares are affected by Mainstar’s policy change?
1,270,566 shares were held through Mainstar IRA accounts on 4/21/23, per the review of the Stockholder List on 6/5/23.
https://i.imgur.com/5Z6oh1i.png
Has this happened before with other IRA custodians?
Yes. About 1 year ago, Ally invest performed a similar policy change for the IRA accounts which they were custodian for, and DRS shares were moved back to their account with the DTCC.
What available recourse is there for shareholders whose shares are now returning to DTCC?
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Find another IRA custodian willing to engage with Computershare and direct register on your behalf. HOWEVER - it is always possible that a willing custodian could rescind this option in the future, as shown first by Ally and now by Mainstar.
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Cash out of your IRA, taking any tax hit, and buy shares → DRS → book to ensure title ownership.
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Open a self managed LLC to become custodian of your own self directed IRA, and then DRS. IRA Financial Trust and Camaplan are two currently known companies that will assist in this process. See this post for more details (skip the now outdated sections on Mainstar): https://www.reddit.com/r/Superstonk/comments/yig3v7/want_to_drs_your_ira_start_here_easy_and/
Self directed IRA guide: https://www.reddit.com/r/Superstonk/comments/w4rpor/how_to_guide_true_selfdirected_irasdira_custodian/
- While not an immediate solution, investors can also email GME investor relations (ir@gamestop.com) requesting that GME explore the possibility of Computershare serving as an IRA custodian. Although the GME IR team historically has not responded to many outreach emails over the last two years, showing the interest from their investors may make a difference in getting this functionality enabled. It is possible that if they get enough requests it will make a difference.
This is unfortunate, but seeing the total number having two commas... That's kind of a sign it's getting really close...
I mean, who is going to care about less than 0.5% of the total shares in existence?
Seems like I'll have to go create my own company. Add for those that complain about "take the tax hit." It must be nice to not have a tax hit larger than your total household income and not have family to worry about... I for one can't, I absolutely can NOT put my own family's lives in jeopardy over this. It's literally also saying, "sell shares to cover the cost."
That has been pulled for so many other things, but it's better to sell a portion of 1 share to book, rather than 40% of an individual's shares.
Holy crap!!! Is it really that bad? I don't know how the IRA stuff works, but that sounds absolutely horrible. No wonder so many people don't want to take the hit. What an absolutely criminal f*^#&$n system.
It is that bad for my situation. I've invested generically in the system for a couple decades following the all knowing advice. Put it in index funds that follow the market, don't do anything too risk adverse, you can't beat stock pickers... You know, the ones that force you to keep into that system.
It ended up being a pretty heafty amount I've accomplished before this whole saga started. 2020 was a shock to the total amount, but still doing better than most.
The main problem is the US tax code is a progressive system. The less you make, the less you pay seems to be a valid consensus.
Problem is, the higher your income (not investments as that's a different part of the code, and it's how many billionaires hold their wealth) the more that money is taxed. As any money that is taken out of a traditional account (not dealing with ROTH as that has it's own scenario... See lots of crappy parts) that money is considered income and it's placed on your top income bracket (federally the highest being 37% of the amount of money, not including state, local, county taxes which for me adds up to that tax hit in at least the 60% rate). That's a very broad overview, and I could do things to make it work, but there's a consideration of my personal obligations that also put the strain on resources (mortgage, childcare, bills).
If I were to do this hit, my only recourse is to sell quite a few of the shares (which means I guarantee the losses of decades of retirement savings I've worked for).
That amount is a drop in the bucket in the total shares you see, but we've been at this for over 2 years now, who knows how much longer it'll be before MOASS happens, let alone when I'll get that "tax hit" back.
I'm willing to pay what I need to guarantee the shares don't get sold (wasn't that the original premise). It seems the LLC route is the next step to jump over.
Wow. Just... wow. This is truly a f$&*$n fight. I really hope that the LLC route works out for you if you do it.
Much respect to you & everyone else going through this.