How to deal with short sellers

When Whitney Tilson said he was short Netflix in size, Reed Hastings (the netflix CEO) responded directly to him:

https://seekingalpha.com/article/24...-whitney-tilson-cover-your-short-position-now

Hastings went through each point Tilson had made, and addressed each and every one of them without exception.

This was Whitney Tilson's response:

https://seekingalpha.com/article/252316-whitney-tilson-why-we-covered-our-netflix-short

Since the date of that article, NFLX is up 663% - not in a straight line, but that's the number. Respectfully engaging with critics of the company and addressing their concerns whilst continuing to execute against their strategic plan has reaped huge rewards for them and their shareholders.

So how is this related to MSB? Transparency and engagement.

Transparency

If MSB's science is as good as they spruik, then publish all the data in a peer reviewed journal - if it's that good, then everyone will buy the stock, shorts will cover and they'll get partners beating down their door. Failure to do this just emboldens short sellers to think that MSB are hiding bad data.

Engagement

The biggest critic of MSB has been Dr Craig Collie, ex Macquarie and now Regal. Imagine if MSB engaged with him and addressed all of the public criticisms of the science that he has made, and persuaded him he was wrong. They could even have a sit down at a conference and release the discussion! The failure to engage with critics on their reasonable concerns has given further weight to those concerns, and shows that MSB's management is scared of the spotlight such open debate would shine on them.

Talk of nefarious conspiracies of short sellers is nonsense - the silence from MSB when it comes to publishing data and engaging with critics is the cause of their woes. Well that and rubbish clinical trial results and a massive cash burn of course!