Lanny Davis: Transparency By 'shorts' On 'for-profit' Schools Needed, Too

May 26 -- a noted Wall Street short-seller, Steve Eisman, gave a speech criticizing certain public companies that are for-profit colleges and universities. Eisman is known for "shorting" stocks in public companies in the sub-prime industry before the collapse -- meaning he made tons of money when these companies' share values went down or virtually collapsed. For the uninitiated, at the risk of oversimplifying, you make money "shorting" stock by borrowing someone's stock at a certain share value and then, if the share values go down, repaying the loan at a lower amount, pocketing the difference. Eisman, in his May 26 speech before the Ira Sohn Research Conference in New York City, criticized some for-profit colleges and universities that are public companies (such as the Apollo Group, which owns the University of Phoenix, Corinthian College and Kaplan University (owned by The Washington Post).