RE:RE:RE:RE:Stock being manipulated??throwaway11 wrote: Just to elaborate further on this...
This intense, constant anonymous selling seems to be happening with a specific type of microcap I own, and what makes it so questionable is that most of them are ones with a high degree of certainty in their technical/commercial success - e.g. the more research I do, the more apparent it is they have a legitimate tech that works, that is competitive against all categorical peers, they are partnered with / are endorsed by well known, reputable institutions, organizations and research bodies/universities, they will solve big problems, so on---
And these are the ones getting beat down.
Yet there are also a ton of garbage microcaps, financed no doubt with equally or much less trustworthy means, full of suspect board members, that barely seem to get anything done. Some of these I admittedly owned, even up until recently, until I started committing more time to DD. I still watch them anyway, and this is not happening to them. At most, they were corrected from the Feb 2021 market bubble. They aren't being ruthlessly tanked on literally a continuous basis.
So at first I was thinking that perhaps a number of the financing parties for these microcaps had overextended themselvse during that early 2021 microcap bubble and a few even did private placements (e.g. Willow Biosciences took one I think at somewhere from $1.30-$2.00?), they ate crow, and now they were getting leverage called home and needed to cover it So this meant liquidating or trimming some positions, or repositioning to take other short term opportunities.
But this selling seems to supercede that. As per my above observations - it's only the great microcaps that are taking this. The specific targeting of these companies that are actually achieving a lot.
It looks bad, and some of it is brazen. Another company I own shares in, Sixth Wave, would have huge sell walls appear - sometimes for close to $100k, whenever there was very good news. I actually watched them adding to the ask in realtime as buyers swept in. Anyone with an incentive to let the stock price rise (read: an investor) would allow the bids to stack before selling into them if this was an institution trying to balance their books. This person had no interest in allowing bids to stack at a higher price. IOW, It's irrational selling behavior from the perspective of anyone who is not trying to destroy the stock. This happened several times with Sixth Wave, by the way.
One user (at sixth wave's board) suggested the stocks were being shorted into a private placement, with the private placement being used to cover the short position. Which, unbelievably (according to G&M) is still more or less a legal practice in Canada. I didn't see a massive increase in shares short in the microcaps I have this is happening to, so I'm not sure if I buy this.
I think it is possible that there are behind closed door partnerships or well hidden relationships between companies or firms that are being coordinated to actively sell the price down so that firms can get financing at absolutely rock bottom prices.
E.g. if it is possible one institution is selling to other institutions or arms length . This is why you see both anonymous buyers and sellers. They are playing hot potato so a firm looking to do a PP is not implicated if they have a suspiciously well timed private placement right at the market bottom after a ton of selling by just one or two parties. On thin volume, loor liquidity, obscure stocks with big price gaps, this strategy would be pretty easy.
Either way, these situations would basically be financial foul play. It seems like Canada's market in particular is an absolute gongshow of manipulation, and except to consider the majority of Canada's politicians, if they are aware of it, are complicit or even participatory, I have to wonder how it hasn't become a more hot button political issue.
Interesting post and well written. I've also watched this occur with another stock that I did own but no longer own since the spring of 2021. It is also great technology but I think it could be managed better in my opinion. But I have continued to watch it. Same theme. Anytime the price looks to want to rise along comes some house (usually BMO, Anon, or TD accounts) to sell it down. This occurs repeatedly. Or it'll run up for a day on no news then drop back lower than where it started but a liquidity event was created. For no apparent reason.
Even though it is a large float, it is an illiquid stock and tightly held by insiders. So, sell side icebergs do not have to be large to hold the sp from rising. For example, there's been a block of 50k shares for sale at 1.15 and another at 1.19 for over a week now. When someone sees it they may say "that doesn't look good" and sell in to it. The blocks sit because the chance they will be taken out is low. So selling continues to drop the price. I've seen this before with this same equity, among others, and have literally watched the berg get pulled after a goal seemed to be achieved at that time.
As well, yesterday for example, there was a 100 bid lot on the sell side for hours (happens frequently with this one) and the share price dropped .08 at one point during the day on about $165k dollars of shares sold. That .08 drop on such a low dollar share value reduced the marketcap by about $14MM (million).
Is it market games? I don't know but this isn't the first one I've seen like this in my travels. Hard to prove and there is clearly a lack of will among Canadian regulators or politicians to do so. And when you have the chair of the CRTC having beers with the CEO of Bell, well, not much more to say.
https://nationalpost.com/news/politics/crtc-chairman-defends-meeting-with-bell-ceo-at-pub
The US SEC is far more aggressive with improprieties than Canada because they know markets need confidence in fair operation. As well, Canada is well known as a naked short haven so it's no wonder companies seek listings in the US if they can.
Aside from garbage Canadian stock markets and crooked regulators, I like what I see with BEE in terms of the technology itself. Genius idea. Love it! hopefully it's not another disappointment like the previous one I held shares in. I mean I made money there but I would also like to have seen it succeed because the technology is so good.
I'm not in here yet but watching very closely.