JS on Smart Investor (video interview), page-25

He never said who gave him a copy of the Ownership Matters report. He said it was circulated to investors on Monday. Then he decided to write a story Tuesday.

Knowing who received a copy of the report and knew the AFR was going to report on it will most likely tell you who could've shorted the stock. Might be quite a few possible people actually.

Unless Ownership Matters did the report because they were simply interested. But I couldn't find it published on their website which leads me to think someone or an organisation paid for it and then expressly gave it to the AFR to prompt reporting. Perhaps they already knew the AFR were interested on a story and they wanted to help it along?

I doubt the journalist was in on anything. Someone just knew how to work the media / take advantage of the AFR interest.