Hey edgck,I don't believe it had anything to do with Mt Gibson....

Hey edgck,
I don't believe it had anything to do with Mt Gibson. I think it was the naive assumption that because most other producers saw big increases in their AISC / costs , that, therefore our quarterly would show the same. But of course it showed that we remained within guidance. Then they burned. They added around 6 or 7 million positions between mid sep and early oct in anticipation of a shock quarterly. Going off the chart you could presume their average return to be approx $3.10. They stopped adding and became nervous during October. They started closing positions at loss or close to breakeven and then in November they called the fire brigade. You can see the inferno towards mid November as they buy back shares they sold for $3.10 at $4 and above.
I believe the shorts are at least 95% represented by Vaneck clients and perhaps Vanguard clients to a lesser extent.
When you buy GDX or GDXJ from Vaneck you buy a little slice of CMM. When an institution or hedge fund etc wants to short the gold sector Vaneck provides the facility for them to sell your shares. Vaneck charges you to buy, skims your divvy, hires out your shares charges you an annual lack of performance fee etc. If the shorting party is unable to close their position, unfortunately for holders, the loss is rolled into the fund. Vaneck state that their policy does not allow for any more than 33% of the fund to be loaned out for shorting or call plays at any one time.
Vaneck own 10% of our book. Therefore we can expect up to 3.3% of our book to be short on their account at any point.
All ETFs are parasitic in essence. They survive and thrive by milking dumb money. They are a services middleman scalping between the exchange and the market in both directions. 10% of our book moves with the sector regardless of our exceptional fundamentals. It is critical in my eyes that the board holds enough shares collectively to stop any attempts by Vaneck or others to have one of their stooges installed on our board.
But I don't want a beef with the mark of the beast - so I will say that they do this legally and the concept is very clever albeit advanced swindling.
And it is not Vaneck that is shorting our stock - it is their clients utilising the facility they offer.
Hope this helps Legend