RE:RE:from 759 000 to 2,6 M$ shares shorted in 2 weeks Yes, pre-offering shorting in Canada is a real thing and a big problem -- so much so that as part of the Capital Markets Modernization Taskforce that is currently ongoing within the Ontario government, a movement to profhibit short-selling in connection with prospectus offerings and private placements has been proposed.
There's two ways it works:
1/ investment houses who are long on the stock will still short some of the offering as a hedge
2/ (as per @namazon)
An investment bank or trading house gets wind of a pending financing. That enttity shorts the stock which brings in cash. They then participate in the actual financing using the cash from the short to buy shares. New shares are received by the entity, from the financing, which is used to cover the short... no buyback in the market required. Link to the market modernization task-force recommendation that discusses short selling prior to prospectus' (scroll down to view the key paragraph):
https://www.ontario.ca/document/capital-markets-modernization-taskforce-consultation-report-july-2020/22-regulation-competitive-advantage qwerty76 wrote: Yes these numbers dont make sense.
The trading stats data only showed 1.5 million short trades during the period. But the consolidated report shows the short position increased by 1.8 million.
It must be people that are going to take part in the the offering, so they are shorting the stock ahead of time........... Just my guess