I just checked Shortman and they show a big spike in shorts ....

I just checked Shortman and they show a big spike in shorts . Not sure that the ASX or short reporting is reliable though.
Anyway , after CVN made its great discovery at Dorado , the shorts moved in and have been playing havoc with the share price which in my opinion is now severely undervalued.
Shorts do it , not because they believe the share is going to go down because of bad news , but because they know by strategic selling they can push the price down. They specialise in this with stocks that are some way off production and will normally pick on stocks where they think a cap raise will occur.
Incidentally, I wish I had of sold CVN when it rushed up to 55 cents or more . It is now sitting around 25 cents , despite looking like it has a bright future.
Finally, I am not downramping here , it is just what I have seen happen with other stocks.
I firmly believe that shorting should be limited to large cap companies.