Just some comments about our "shorter" friends - I hope it is...

Just some comments about our "shorter" friends - I hope it is isn't too long-winded!.

In the 5 months from mid Feb to mid Jul 2020, the outstanding PAR shorts rose from around 1m to 9.6m. Looking at PAR's share prices during that rollercoaster Covid period (down from a $4.50 high to $1.08 low, then back to $3.88), I would guess the shorter average price for those extra 8.6m shorts would have been around $2.60 (meaning investment of around $22m).

15 months or so later (from mid Jul 2020), the total shorts outstanding have barely changed, showing virtually the same 9.56m as at 29 Oct 2021 ie at the trading halt. During that 15 months, PAR's share price had progressively slid to as low as $1.76 in Sep 21, and to $2.06 when the trading halt was called.

It doesn't appear that the shorters have made much attempt to cash in their profits over that last 15 months given the total shorts have not changed. At $2.06, they were probably up a nice 20% or so. But post the trading halt with the share price now not far from $2.50 (having reached $2.69), the shorters are barely in front, seemingly a bad mistake.

Of particular interest is what happened shorts-wise on 3 Nov when the crucial FDA Phase 3 announcement was released. ASX's daily report for 3 Nov confirmed there were 518k new shorts - that's 518k sells out of the day's huge turnover of around 8m shares. The big question was would the shorters move to short-cover to exit at least some of their positions?

And the answer is NO. Today's ASIC report on total outstanding shorts as at 3 Nov shows 9.51m, a minor drop of 50,000 on the day. So there were 518k new shorts & 558k short-covers for the day, barely changing the overall position.

So, very positively, that means the 23% rise on 3 Nov was not due to short covering (ie forced buying) - and any short covering of the 9.5m outstanding shorts remains to be considered by the shorters. One would think that if the share price can get another leg up, the pressure is going to increase on the short covering (ie forced buying) - but while that sounds promising, I have consistently been baffled at the tactics/logic of shorts across a range of stocks!