If that poster holds out hope that those 17,000 shares of PTOI worth $850 will recover to the $27,000 spent on them, he/she could buy 17,000 more shares and then sell 17,000 shares 31 days later to avoid the wash sale and take the tax loss this year. Depending on the tax situation, that could mean up to an extra $10,000 back at tax time. That $10,000 could then buy an extra 200,000 shares of PTOI at the current $0.05/share. Essentially that would have Uncle Sam subsidizing the purchase of a scam stock.