RE: Strange share price movements18 Feb 2021 13:51
having watched this for months there does seem to be a pretty reliable pattern:
Normal spread is 2p (eg) sell 88p buy 90p
If there is enough buying demand , the MM's push the spread up to 6p and sometime 7p (eg sell 88p buy 94p) to reduce the demand for buying.
If that's doesn't work they then push the selling price up closer to the buy price (eg sell 90p buy 94p) to incentivise some sellers. If demand is still there to buy, then the selling price moves very close to the buy price with almost no spread (eg sell 93p buy 94p) in a final effort to get sellers to sell. Its only when that fails do we see a "real" move in the SP which might in my example end with a 95p sell 97p buy.
So I think, given the potential volatility of this stock and the MM's keen desire not to be caught out on the wrong side of a sharp movement, play around with the spread in this fashion to manage an orderly market which I think they actually do very well (for the most part).
So to sum up, move to large spread means "abnormal" activity, followed by narrowing spread is activity increasing or at least being maintained, with, eventually if all else fails, an overall shift in buy sell spread figures.