Every stock is different phho - literally. MHM has the relative dissadvantage of being a Co with a new, relatively untried technology that, despite the not insignificant shareholding of the originators, still has a fairly wide open share register dominated by small shareholders.
It also has a large overhang of shares that have been traded above the current s/price - some 100m shares, equivalent to it's effective issued capital were traded in 4mths not 18mths ago, obviously there was a lot of churn between traders at those levels, but without a doubt there would still be a lot of trapped investors who bought in well above the current levels and would take every opportunity to cut their losses. Without a corner stone investor prepared to support the price, the shareprice is always going to be at the whim of whatever trapped investor blinks next.
On top of this there was another 2m worth of MHMO's turned over in the market panic of Sep/Oct this year in the range of 40-60c. Anyone who bought up then would have been hard pressed to offload them in the MHMO market, which only has 6 or so months to run, but given the 20c excise price could have easily gotten rid of a reasonable trading parcel and still locked in a substantial profit - I know because I did. There have been over a million options converted in the past couple months, while total traded MHM volumes has only been 3m or so, my own opinion has the majority of those MHMO's being sold back to the market as MHM's.
LRS on the other hand has virtually no share overhang/overhead compared to MHM, with its shareprice pretty much were it was at 12mths ago (despite a wild ride in between). LRS also has a much tighter share register, with the top 20 controlling nearly 70% of the share register, leaving the shareprice far more open to being push around, the top 20 for MHM by contrast only hold around 35% of the share register - it is wide open.
Unfortunately despite MHM broadly meeting most of the milestones and targets it has set itself in terms of developing its Aluminium slag processing business, the market and any cornerstone investor, is still waiting for it to achieve a key metric - profitability. At least insofar as how it is reported in the financial statements. It may be true that they're writing off costs through the PnL that other Co's would choose to capitalise, and the delays in terms of getting its product off the wharf has introduced an unfortunate element of doubt in the eyes of some investors (read more trapped investors blinking), but until those dollars start coming in, it will continue to be a waiting game for most investors.
People seem to have the attitude that getting a business up and running on the other side of the world is as simple as waving a wand - it takes time. Really the only means you have of gauging their ultimate likelihood of success or not, lies with their history, what they've been able to achieve and under the circumstances they've been able to achieve it.
If you are a investor trapped in above at higher prices, you have my sympathy, we've all been there at some time or another. You have to ask yourself if you believe in the stock or not, and are happy in your own mind as to whether or not they're achieving reasonable targets and milestones, or alternatively cut your losses and run, or if you've taken on too big a position either bail out or sit tight, either way treat it as a learning experience.
If you are a LT holder than I believe you are laughing. The s/price is still well above your buy in position, and there has been enough volatility in the stock of the past 18mths to ensure ample opportunities to balance and rebalance any position such that you could easily be free carried or at a substantially reduced cost base. Even if you've done nothing your still sitting on a substantial enough buffer of profits to allow you cut MHM the slack to get on with what they're doing.
If you're a trader of MHM then chances are you are stuck here (hence the painful bleating from some quarters). You should have probably done your trading homework a little better and made sure you kept your position small enough that you could easily get out if liquidity dries up - as it often is the want for these small stocks (I would keep a close eye on LRS's liquidity too btw).
Really trading small stocks, like MHM and LRS, can be very exciting, but all too often traders end up with too big a position that they can't get out of without a substantial loss, and all they can do afterwoods is sit hunched over their computer lamenting their ever growing paper losses, raising endless speculation as to why they are all doomed, but without being balsy enough to do something about it and lock in their loss and move on to some other trade.
MHM Price at posting:
77.5¢ Sentiment: LT Buy Disclosure: Held
(20min delay)