Rules, Guidelines and TOS

General Information

Below you will find a list of guidelines as well as a brief explanation of some terms you may hear a lot on the forum. We will ask that you follow these guidelines, use common sense, and generally help make this community a helpful and friendly place.

Please be aware that no member of the forum team will ever contact you via any means and ask for your email address, password, or any other personal information. Upon registration you will be required to provide a valid email that you will need access to in order to participate in our forum. This site will also obviously collect your password as a means for you to identify yourself when logging in to the forum but the password is encrypted in our database and we do not have a way of viewing the unencrypted password. We will also log your IP with each post to prevent abuse.

We would like you to know that all profile fields excluding username, password, and email address are optional. However, be aware that all optional profile fields that collect possibly personal data are publicly viewable by all and thus if you do not feel comfortable with unregistered visitors seeing your gender, age, and so forth, do not fill out any optional profile field.

Please note that we will never divulge your email address, password, or any other piece of data we may obtain from you that is not otherwise publicly viewable by all without your express consent unless your actions on this site are illegal in which case you will be reported to the proper authorities and all information divulged to them.

For your own safety we would like to inform you it may be unwise of you to publicly display personal information such as account information, phone number, postal address, zip code, last name, or anything that may allow a visitor of the site to contact you in a very direct manner without your knowledge or consent.

Please be aware that as a registered user you may edit your profile at any time by accessing the following: User CP -> Edit Profile.

All messages found on this site express the views of the author, and in no way can ETFtalk.com be held accountable for content.

General Terms of Service:

In order to promote a useful and beneficial environment to investors, we attempt to maintain certain policies or "rules of the road."

The basic rules are fairly simple in principle:

1. Be polite and respectful.

2. Conduct yourself generally as you would at any professional encounter with respected colleagues.

3. Harassment and irritation of other members will not be tolerated. Please try to avoid offending other members. We understand that you cannot please every one all the time. However, when we get a variety of similar complaints, a review will be conducted.

4. If you see a post that appears to violate any of our guidelines, do not respond to the post, or any offensive post. Send a Report Post or a private message to the administrator or moderator(s) notifying them of the subject post.

5. Watch your language in general, though a bit of occasional adult language is understood, though not encouraged.

6. Reserved

7. Do not incite flame wars, and please, try to refrain from chiming into offensive posts.

8. We understand that disputes will occur – it’s a fact of life – but we will not understand if members are involved in a prolonged squabble. If you cannot work it out between yourselves, ask for a moderator or for the administrator to intervene.

9. Try to stay on topic if you can.

10. Stick to a reasonably relevant topic.

11. Treat others as you would like to be treated.

12. Do not annoy the moderator(s) or administrator.

13. Otherwise, behave legally and ethically.

14. [Reserved] User Infraction System.

15. Please do not make your signature excessively long, it slows the loading and causes unnecessary scrolling. General guidelines are no longer than the box this text is in.

16. Do not create more than one account for yourself.

Regarding Investment Advice:

We want to make this clear:

ETF talk provides a forum for investment and trading discussion, as well as samples of investment research. ETFtalk.com and ETF talk does not warrant any of the information posted here, nor does such constitute investment advice by our posters or us. We do not endorse any service that advertises on the site, or any poster who discusses his trades on the site.

Let us repeat: We are NOT your investment advisor. Do NOT take any action based upon what you read at this site without seeking independent confirmation as well as competent professional advice.

In other words, your decisions are your own. If you don't have a signed contractual agreement with US, then what you read here is NOT investment advice to you, no matter what you think it looks like.

7 Simple ways to get yourself Banned from ETF talk Message Boards:

Yes, you can be banned from ETFtalk.com, and here's how:

#1) Spam the boards.

#2) Attempting to create multiple accounts

#3) Ignore the rules of decency and professionalism as well as any other rules listed here.

#4) Intentionally post false or misleading information, including the use of dual aliases.

#5) Provide untrue or incorrect information about your self while registering or posting.

#6) Use ETFtalk.com for illegal purposes or for the transmission of material that is unlawful, harassing, libelous, invasive of another's privacy, abusive, threatening, harmful, inordinately vulgar, obscene, tortuous, improper or otherwise objectionable.

#7) Use ETFtalk.com in any way that infringes or may infringe the intellectual property rights, copyrights or other rights of another. For example, you may NOT copy and paste a press release, article, or newsletter in its entirety into a post on ETF talk, without explicit permission of the author, although standard 'fair use' is permitted. When in doubt ALWAY provide a link to the source of your copied material. Commercial posting that is relevant is acceptable - if and only if- it is tasteful AND if you provide value to the forum and is not in direct competition with ETF talk. When in doubt, check with us. Please alert us to other members violating the Terms of Service by notifying us via e-mail

What are the consequences for violating a rule / guideline?

The consequences of violating a posting rule/ guideline are fairly simple. We will warn, edit, use the infraction system, lock posts, or impose a temporarily or permanently ban. We do not have a set-in-stone strike-out system in place; we simply play each situation by ear. Breaking the rules will get you at least get a warning. Upon repeated offenses, temporary and/or permanent bans from the board may be issued.

Please be aware that a member that re-registers while banned (be it temporarily or permanently) may be permanently banned.

Note: We reserve the right to remove or edit any post, for any reason, at any time. We prefer not to do this, but as a last resort it will be done. If it becomes necessary to continually remove or edit offensive posts, you may be banned, regardless of any positive attributes of any posts.

In addition:

Any thread or post containing an unauthorized solicitation or advertisement will be deleted.

Posting Guidelines Summary

Use common sense when posting and you shouldn't have nothing to worry about as we are fairly lax about our guidelines but we ask that you follow the simple few outlined above. These are the guidelines of the forum; they are not set in stone, and they do not include everything. All members are responsible for keeping up to date with these guidelines.

What are Moderators / Super Moderators / Administrators?

A Moderator is the first rank in the forum team hierarchy. Each moderator will be assigned to a forum or small group of forums to keep clean. Generally the tasks they perform in the forums they moderate include deleting unnecessary posts, moving inappropriate threads to a private forum, closing questionable topics, and providing input to the higher levels of the forum team.
A Super Moderator performs the same task as a Moderator on a global basis. While a Moderator monitors a single forum or small group of forums, a Super Moderator watches over all forums. This is the middle position, a step above Moderator and a step below Administrator.
An Administrator can do anything you can think of. Administrators can install new features, ban members, adjust all technical aspects of the forum, and so forth. This is the highest position on the forum team and is rarely given out.
Overall, the summary is the Moderator and Super Moderator teams are responsible for keeping the forums clean, and the Administrative team is responsible for every aspect of the entire forum.

General rules for moderators are:
1. Moderators serve the Administrator and Members.
2. They follow the rules and are asked to set a good example.
3. Generally (initially) problems should be resolved in an easy and non-threatening manner.
4. Moderators should not take sides, but should be firm with violations of the rules.

How do I become a Moderator / Super Moderator / Administrator?

The best way to help us is by becoming a friendly, active member of the site.
We base our decisions for members of the forum team on a variety of qualities. The member must be active, friendly, as well as helpful in the forum(s) we are considering them for. We do not pick a user who has a small amount of posts and has only recently joined, as we cannot properly evaluate you in a short amount of time based on limited content.

Legal Terms of Use

The ETFtalk.com forum has some moderation, but otherwise, it is largely a self-policing discussion site, which means that our site administrators will respond and react to e-mails received from members regarding violations of the Terms of Use. Upon receipt of such e-mails, the ETFtalk.com Administrators can and will take appropriate action (at their sole discretion), including, but not limited to the removal of post(s) and the suspension or termination of account(s).
1. ACKNOWLEDGMENT AND ACCEPTANCE OF TERMS OF USE

1.1. ETF talk. ("ETFtalk.com") is pleased to provide you with access and use of our site under this Terms of Service Agreement, as well as any amendments to such. ETFtalk.com reserves the right, at its discretion, to change, modify, add or remove all or part of the Terms of Service at any time. ETFtalk.com will notify you of changes by posting a message on the Service.

1.2. By accepting the Terms of Service, you agree to (a) provide accurate, complete and current information as prompted during the Registration process, and (b) to maintain and update your e-mail address to keep it accurate, complete and current. If you fail to do so, ETFtalk.com reserves the right to terminate your Service membership. As part of the Registration process, you will select a password and user name. Choose wisely. ETFtalk.com may refuse to grant you a user name that impersonates someone else, is or may be illegal, is or may be protected by trademark or other proprietary right law, is vulgar or otherwise offensive, or may cause confusion, as determined by ETFtalk.com in its sole discretion.

1.3. Members may maintain only one active membership with the Service. By accepting the Terms of Service, you warrant that you have no other membership(s) with the Service. If you forget your user name or password, please use the lost password link to have an email sent to the address you registered with.

1.4. BY COMPLETING THE REGISTRATION PROCESS AND CLICKING THE "I ACCEPT" BUTTON, YOU ARE AGREEING TO BE BOUND BY ALL TERMS AND CONDITIONS SET FORTH IN THIS TERMS OF SERVICE AGREEMENT. If these terms and conditions or any future changes are unacceptable to you, or cause you no longer to be in compliance with the Terms of Service, you may cancel your membership by sending e-mail or private message to the administrator, etftalk. If you choose to leave the forum please do not ask to have your posts removed as they become the property of ETFtalk.com once they have been posted. Should you wish to no longer be a member of this site, we will give your account a general nickname and delete all your personal information.

2. MEMBER CONDUCT 2.1.

ETFtalk.com includes information, views, opinions and recommendations of individuals and organizations of interest to the investment community. ETFtalk.com assumes no responsibility for the accuracy, currency, completeness or usefulness of information in any material available via the Service and it does not endorse any opinions or recommendations posted by members, nor does it give tax or investment advice or advocate the purchase or sale of any security or investment. You should exercise discretion and skepticism before relying on information in messages, since it may be incorrect or misleading. Members may pretend to be people that they are not. Some members may have dishonest and/or deceitful intentions or may have inaccurate information -- Use some sense! You should make an independent investigation before making any financial decisions, and if you rely on information posted by other members you do so solely at your own risk, which may, in point of fact, be considerable. Even the best information can be totally irrelevant to stock performance. Markets are risky. Check with your trusted, and contractually obligated financial advisor before making any decisions based upon what you find at the ETFtalk.com Web site(s). Posters to our board are NOT your financial advisers, and they aren't responsible for your investment decisions, unless they willfully engage in fraud and misrepresentation.

ETFtalk.com does not necessarily review, screen or edit messages posted by members. When we do so, it is at our discretion and not our obligation. Nonetheless, ETFtalk.com reserves the right to monitor or remove any information transmitted or received through the Service, or to terminate your membership and use of the Service, at any time, without notice, in its sole discretion. It is members' responsibility to bring violations of the Terms of Service by other members to ETFtalk.com attention, although ETFtalk.com does not guarantee any action based on such information.

The following actions, among others, may result in removal of messages and/or termination of your membership.

a) Using the Service for illegal purposes or for the transmission of material that is unlawful, harassing, libelous, invasive of another's privacy, abusive, threatening, harmful, excessively vulgar, obscene, tortuous or otherwise objectionable.
b) Posting material, non-public information about companies, without the authorization to do so.
c) Posting or transmitting third party copyrighted information or in any way infringing on the intellectual property rights, contractual or fiduciary rights of others.
d) Providing false information on your registration form, or impersonating someone else.
e) Using the Service for the transmission of junk mail, spam, chain letters, or unsolicited mass distribution of e-mail.
f) Using the Service for the transmission of advertising or promotion of any product or service.
g) Posting improper or off-topic messages.
h) Violating the letter or spirit of the Terms of Use.
i) Harassing or willfully annoying ETFtalk.com Administrators or Moderators.
2.2. Your use of the Service is subject to all applicable local, state, national and international laws and regulations, including but not limited to the U.S. export control laws and regulations, and the rules of any national or other securities exchange, including but not limited to the New York Stock Exchange, the American Stock Exchange or the NASDAQ. You agree not to transmit any material that could constitute or encourage conduct that could constitute a criminal offense, give rise to civil liability or otherwise violate any local, state, national or international law or regulation, or rule of a national or other securities exchange.

2.3. You agree that you are responsible for all statements made and acts or omissions that occur on your membership account while your password is being used, even though users are advised not to rely upon your postings. You agree to waive and hold ETFtalk.com harmless from any claims relating to any action taken by ETFtalk.com as part of its investigation of a suspected violation of the Terms of Service or as a result of its conclusion that a violation of the Terms of Service has occurred, including but not limited to the removal of posts from the Service or the suspension or termination of your membership account. If you believe someone has used your password or account without your authorization, you must notify ETFtalk.com immediately.

2.4. ETFtalk.com reserves the right to access and disclose any information, including user names of accounts and other information, to comply with applicable laws and lawful government requests, to operate its systems properly or to protect itself or its members.

3. PROPRIETARY RIGHTS TO CONTENT

3.1. The content available through the Service is the property of ETFtalk.com or its licensors and is protected by copyrights, trademarks, service marks, patents or other proprietary rights and laws. Content received through the Service may be displayed, reformatted and printed for your personal, non-commercial use only. You agree not to reproduce, retransmit, re-post, distribute, sell, publish, broadcast, create derivative works from, perform, or in any way commercially exploit any of the content, or infringe upon trademarks or service marks displayed or received through the Service, including but not limited to others in the same company or organization, without ETFtalk.com express prior written consent. The one exception to this is occasional reposting of a message board post to another message board, so long as a link to the original post is provided.

3.2. You agree that upon posting information on the Service, you grant ETFtalk.com, and its successors and assigns a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty free, perpetual, non-revocable license under your copyrights or other intellectual property rights, if any, in such material to use, distribute, display, reproduce, and create derivative works from such material in any and all media, in any manner, whole or part, without any duty to account to you. You also grant ETFtalk.com the right to authorize the downloading and printing of such material, or any portion thereof, by end users for their personal use.

4. EXTERNAL LINKS

4.1. The Service contains links to other related World Wide Web Internet sites, resources and members of the Service. ETFtalk.com is not responsible for the availability of these outside resources, or their contents, nor does ETFtalk.com endorse nor is ETFtalk.com responsible for any of the contents, advertising, products or other materials on such sites. Under no circumstances shall ETFtalk.com be held responsible or liable, directly or indirectly, for any loss or damages caused or alleged to have been caused by use of or reliance on any content, goods or services available on such sites. Any concerns regarding any external link should be directed to its respective site administrator or webmaster.

5. FEES AND PAYMENTS

5.1. Certain areas on ETFtalk.com require a paid membership to gain access. Your membership is personal to you, and you may not assign or otherwise transfer your rights or obligations to anyone. You certify that you are 18 years old or older and you agree to be responsible for and pay any charges incurred in connection with your user name and password. Your membership shall continue until ETFtalk.com receives notice of termination from you or ETFtalk.com exercises its rights of termination as described in the Terms of Service. ETFtalk.com reserves the right to change at any time any membership, or service fees and billing methods.

6. DISCLAIMER OF WARRANTIES AND LIABILITY

6.1. The Service is provided AS IS and AS AVAILABLE, without warranty of any kind. ETFtalk.com EXPRESSLY DISCLAIMS ANY AND ALL WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, WHETHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO: (A) ANY WARRANTIES AS TO THE AVAILABILITY, ACCURACY, COMPLETENESS, CURRENTNESS OR RELIABILITY OF THE CONTENT AVAILABLE THROUGH THE SERVICE, OR THE SERVICE ITSELF; (B) ANY WARRANTIES THAT THE SERVICE WILL BE UNINTERRUPTED, TIMELY, SECURE, OR ERROR FREE, OR THAT SOFTWARE DEFECTS WILL BE CORRECTED; AND (C) WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE OR NON-INFRINGEMENT. YOU ACKNOWLEDGE AND AGREE THAT ANY MATERIAL AND/OR DATA DOWNLOADED OR OTHERWISE OBTAINED THROUGH THE USE OF THE SERVICE IS DONE AT YOUR OWN DISCRETION AND RISK AND THAT YOU WILL BE SOLELY RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY DAMAGES TO YOUR COMPUTER SYSTEM OR LOSS OF DATA THAT RESULTS FROM THE DOWNLOAD OF SUCH MATERIAL AND/OR DATA. NO ADVICE OR INFORMATION, WHETHER ORAL OR WRITTEN, OBTAINED BY YOU FROM ETFtalk.com OR THROUGH THE SERVICE SHALL CREATE ANY WARRANTY NOT EXPRESSLY MADE HEREIN. ETFtalk.com, ITS OFFICERS, DIRECTORS, OWNERS, AGENTS AND EMPLOYEES, SHALL NOT BE LIABLE TO YOU OR ANYONE ELSE FOR ANY LOSS OR INJURY RESULTING FROM USE OF THE SERVICE, CAUSED IN WHOLE OR IN PART BY ITS NEGLIGENCE OR CONTINGENCIES BEYOND ITS CONTROL IN PROCURING, COMPILING, INTERPRETING, REPORTING OR DELIVERING THE SERVICE AND ANY CONTENT THROUGH THE SERVICE. IN NO EVENT WILL ETFtalk.com, ITS OFFICERS, DIRECTORS, OWNERS, AGENTS AND EMPLOYEES, BE LIABLE TO YOU OR ANYONE ELSE FOR ANY DECISION MADE OR ACTION TAKEN BY YOU IN RELIANCE ON SUCH CONTENT. ETFtalk.com, ITS OFFICERS, DIRECTORS, OWNERS, AGENTS AND EMPLOYEES, SHALL NOT BE LIABLE TO YOU OR ANYONE ELSE FOR ANY DIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL, INDIRECT, OR SIMILAR DAMAGES, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES, RESULTING FROM THE USE OR THE INABILITY TO USE THE SERVICE. YOU AGREE THAT THE LIABILITY OF ETFtalk.com, IF ANY, ARISING OUT OF ANY KIND OF LEGAL CLAIM (WHETHER IN CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE) IN ANY WAY CONNECTED WITH THE SERVICE OR THE CONTENT IN THE SERVICE SHALL NOT EXCEED THE AMOUNT YOU PAID ETFtalk.com FOR THE USE OF THE SERVICE. SOME JURISDICTIONS DO NOT ALLOW THE EXCLUSION OF CERTAIN WARRANTIES, SO SOME OF THE ABOVE EXCLUSIONS MAY NOT APPLY TO YOU.

7. INDEMNIFICATION

7.1. You agree to indemnify and hold ETFtalk.com, its officers, directors, owners, agents and employees, harmless from any claim or demand, including reasonable attorneys fees, made by any third party due to or arising out of your use of the Service, the violation of these Terms of Use by you, or the infringement by you, or other user of the Service using your computer, of any intellectual property or other right of any person or entity. We reserve the right, at our own expense, to assume the exclusive defense and control of any matter otherwise subject to indemnification by you.

8. TERMINATION

8.1. You agree that ETFtalk.com may, in its sole discretion, terminate or suspend your access to all or part of the Service for any reason, including, without limitation, breach of the Terms of Service or any subsequent modifications, or attempted assignment of your account by you. Any suspected fraudulent, abusive or illegal activity may be grounds for termination of your membership account and may be referred to appropriate law enforcement authorities. ETFtalk.com shall not be liable to you or any third party for the termination of Service or any claims related to the termination of Service.

8.2. Should you object to any terms and conditions of these Terms of Use or any subsequent changes to the terms and conditions or become dissatisfied with the Service in any way, your only recourse is to immediately: (1) discontinue use of the Service; (2) terminate Service membership; and (3) notify ETFtalk.com of termination by sending an e-mail to one of the Administrators: The moderating team. Continued use of the Service is an acceptance of the Terms of Use and all or any subsequent changes.
8.3. If you terminate your membership or service account within 30 days of your registration, you will be entitled to a refund of your fee if any, in part or in whole, in accordance with the membership plan you selected during the Service Registration/Subscription process. If ETFtalk.com terminates your membership account for a violation of the Terms of Use, including but not limited to during the first 30 days of your membership, you will not be entitled to any refund.

9. LAWS

9.1. The Terms of Service are governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of the State of Utah and the intellectual property laws of the United States, and you agree to submit to the personal jurisdiction of the courts of the state of Utah for any cause or action arising out of or relating to the Service or the Terms of Use. 9.2. You agree that any cause of action arising out of or related to the Service must commence within one (1) year after the cause of action arose; otherwise, such cause of action is permanently barred.

10. ADDITIONAL DISCLAIMER AND WARNING

10.1. The Securities Exchange Commission has expressed concerns that the stock price for companies with small market capitalization (also known as "small cap", "micro cap" or "penny" stocks) may be particularly susceptible to manipulation. Therefore, you should carefully evaluate the information posted by other members about such stocks

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