RE: Short25 May 2018 11:48
Hi Swest.
Cantors (CFEP) and Peel Hunt are two of the market makers on IRR. Along with WINS & SCAP.
CFEP are the lead MM but Peel, in recent times, set completely their own agenda with the share (they sat on the ASK from 33p a couple weeks ago all the way down to 26 and only moved on Wednesday, a couple of hours before close...as, I suspect, they knew an RNS was coming. Though not what it contained)
I wouldn't say that they work together, as such, but there are many occasions when one is top of the Ask and the other top of the bid. So it can't be ruled out.
Yeah, one of them is usually short. That's fine: it increases liquidity on a illiquid and low free-float stock. It's legal and I have no problem with it.
But, because they hold a decent percentage of the available shares, they can accumulate and then dump whenever they want. Moving the share (and any share) at their whim. Profiting in the meantime.
If you (or anyone else) is cynical about this, take a look at AST in 2017 when CFEP shorted the company from 3p to 1.4p with Hendersons shares.
If a surprise announcement comes, it can catch them off guard. HMI in 2016/2017, SOLG in 2016, UKOG 2017, WEB a few days ago. Things shoot up at an incredible level as PI's buy in whilst anyone short buys furiously to close out.
It's a useful first stage of any re-rate.
We saw a couple of 100k plus trades around 25p before the price increased to 34p. I have no proof but I feel confident that those were shorts closing out.
That hasn't happened to IRR yet to my knowledge.
I'm very happy to discuss it, Swest. I can't prove any of it, but if you watch L2 for long enough you start to see the pattern. And the consistent 10k, 20k, 25k, 50k trades on the way up and the way down. Especially yesterday. Almost all 'buys' were for specific denominations. Almost all 'sells' were round-numbers for non-specific denominations. It's not always subtle.