Fidelity does lots of things in an effort to limit their risks and while I agree non margin accounts are not supposed to have their shares borrowed against and the same holds true for retirement accounts however I have heard counter claims. The only absolutely way to be certain you own what you paid for is to have those shares in certificate form and because of that the industry is making it more difficult and expensive to get them in certificate form. The good news is changes are coming albeit very slowly. Go IPIX!!!