Ann: Highly significant gas discoveries at Erregulla Deep-1, page-397

They won't disclose details of their lending volume. So no idea... but SS/Vanguard only went substantial after STX entered into ASX200. One would assume they would exit when STX is out. That said, I just went through the initial substantial notice and they started buying STX last December. Anyway, we will know soon enough

I suspect the index funds have been the main lenders to the shorters because that's how index funds earn a few extra basis points of returns. This can be seen in their substantial notice with all the borrowing/lending arrangements. So if that's the case and they are exiting, they cannot exit until the stocks are either returned to them for them to offload, or the shorters buy the stakes off the index funds to cover their shorts and square the ledger.

The only thing that isn't clear is whether they are holding excess STX shares outside of their ASX200 funds (such as ASX300 or MSCI micro cap). If so, those shares may still be lent out for shortselling. Only thing I'd say is that ASX200 is by far the most followed index on the ASX by quite some distance - even more so than the ASX50 and ASX100 because of its diversity and wider composition as well as liquidity.

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