Out of the thousands of questions I’ve been asked over the years, one question keeps coming up that pisses me off. A bright eye’d newbie trader wants to know what will happen to his OTCBB stock if it gets uplisted to a major exchange like the NASDAQ.

In most cases, there’s nothing you need to do on your part. Your existing stock shares will be converted into the new shares traded under the new ticker symbol on the major exchange (i.e. Nasdaq).

This scenario is called a jumper. There is a good chance that your stock shares will gain in value because it opens your stock up to a whole new set of investors who only trade on major exchanges.

If any change in the ticker symbol takes place, your brokerage firm (i.e. ETrade, Scottrade, etc.) will contact you via your trading console and/or by regular mail.

But let’s be straight here. You are an idiot if you are buying OTCBB stocks hoping they will uplist to a major exchange.

Con-vest publishing companies are more than happy to sell you a subscription to their OTC to Nasdaq stocks. Don’t be a sucker.

I’ve met thousands of traders over the years and not a single trader made money at regularly picking jumpers.

Reality check. If the company was such a good company selling such a hot product, they never would have been listed on the OTCBB in the first place. They would have opted for an original listing on the Nasdaq in the first place. The cost for a listing on a major exchange is hardly more than a listing on the OTCBB. The only difference is the reporting requirements. The disclosure that the company must provide investors on a timely and regular basis.

There’s the dark truth. The only reason a company lists on the OTCBB is precisely because they do not want to meet the stricter reporting requirements of a major exchange. They do not want to disclose to investors the truth about what’s really going on.

While not as bad as the pink sheets, the OTCBB exchange is filled with fraudulent companies who wouldn’t think twice about posting false PRs and scamming you out of your money. Investing in OTCBB stocks is a fools game. Over the long run, you will go broke like everyone else who has tried. I should know. I speak from personal trading experience.

Plus, think about this. The primary reason for investing in OTCBB was to get stocks cheap. Now that we are at a market bottom, many good companies listed on the major exchanges are at crazy OTCBB prices! Plus there’s a lot less risk because stocks on the major exchanges have stricter disclosure and reporting laws they must follow than stocks listed on the OTCBB. So what is the advantage to the OTCBB at this present time? None.