“again, you are assuming fair play. “
I am not assuming anything. This has nothing to do with “fair play”.
It is about how the system actually operates.
I will use the same analogy…
Hiding a short position is as impossible as hiding a withdrawal from your bank account from your bank.
I could go into a lot of detail of why this is, but to over simply put it, once a sale is executed as an initial leg it creates a debit at NSCC until the offsetting leg is executed. That has NOTHING to do with reporting or rules. It is how the system operates.
"Harsh reality is always better than false hope"