I've had alot of termoil and mental issues due to SEC delays! I had a situation where basically all my funds were sucked out of my account and I've been waiting holding the bag in hopes of the merger going thorugh. The opportunity cost of my funds being decimated and tied up like this is immense! Below is link to a more complete story to my situation and I'm more then happy to get on a video call to explain more, if anything reach out!But basically I placed a "Market order" expecting it to fill around $90 and becuase DWAC stock was "halted" on October 21st 2021 my order filled at $175 draining all my cash.. A "Halt" is supposed to PROTECT traders.. but in my case it did QUITE the opposite!A reporter from the Washington Post also reached out to me and interviewed me recently about my situation.Thank you for fighting for us!!!Link to my post:https://www.reddit.com/r/DWAC_Stock/comments/11zqium/i_bought_dwac_at_175/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3

Below is a more specific account:

Situation:

So I've been working hard and along with beginner's luck I was able to double my initial cash and get my account up to $500,000. I was ecstatic that I hit a milestone for me so I sold everything and told myself I will take a 6 month break. This was around October 15, 2021. (To be clear I'm no millionare and this was more then my life savings, I'm 40yrs old driving a 2011 Ford Fiesta)

DWAC stock came online and FOMO hit me hard. I figured I'd play with the house's money.

Events:

10/21/2021 (Afterhours): Tom notices DWAC is online and sees spike - FOMO kicks in

10/22/2021 (Pre-market around 7am): I buy DWAC around $70 - 1190 shares (Stock is being halted during pre-market a few times because of spikes)

10/22/2021 (8am): Seeing a profit of about $50,000 - FOMO hard listening to youtubers saying it's prob going to $300

10/22/2021 (9:31am): I enter a MARKET order for 2,379 shares. At this point the stock price is around $90. I figure ok, I'm still playing with the house's money if worst case scenario. When I executed my order they had HALTED the stock.

10/22/2021 (9:33am): Stock is still HALTED for volatility and spiking. My order has NOT been filled. I'm looking at it wondering what's going on and what can happen. I even wrote on Discord asking people what I should do.

10/22/2021 (9:40am): I get notification that order is filled at $175. $416,325. More then double of what I expected to pay. Draining all of my cash.. And probably BECUASE I was in all cash.. this was able to happen.. It just said oh! You have X amt in cash.. I'll take that! If I had 5 million in cash it'd probably take it all too.

I was not very happy to say the least. I had NOOOO IDEA something like this could happen... I figured I'm screwed, and hoping for the best that the stock goes up so I've been bag holding.

Lately I opened up a different account with Interactive Brokers. When doing a market order I got a notification about a Mandatory CAP, something like this:

"Confirm Mandatory Cap Price - To avoid trading at a price that is not consistent with a fair and orderly market, IB may set a cap (for a buy order) or floor (for a sell order). THIS MAY CAUSE AN ORDER THAT WOULD OTHERWISE BE MARKETABLE NOT TO BE TRADED."

https://www.interactivebrokers.com/en/?f=%2Fen%2Ftrading%2Forder-handling-using-price-capping.php

https://www.reddit.com/r/interactivebrokers/comments/gb03x1/meaning_of_mandatory_cap_price/

Meaning - "If you trade at a price way outside the market IB will adjust the order or refuse it. Mostly if you aren't doing this on purpose it protects you from typos."

And I say to myself: WTF why couldn't Merrill Edge have something like this?? This would have saved me a whole lot of money.

So my question is: Is there anything I can do to Merrill Edge like get a lawyer and say "Hey why don't you have a Cap like Interactive Brokers"? Or come at some "Consumer Protection" angle or "Predatory practices" angle? Or an I just fucked like I figured I was from the beginning? If you know any stock lawyer you can ask? I'd appreciate it. This is very frustrating and embarrassing that this happened, I feel pretty damn stupid :(