Who do you think is driving that narrative? Investment bankers/...

Who do you think is driving that narrative?
Investment bankers/ analysts/ hedge funds/ large investors will make a call on macro factors as well as company specific factors in determining their estimates of fair value for any given stock. You can't say long investors are buying the stock if they believe the price of the material they are selling will go down. Only traders that are pursuing short strategies would be borrowing stock with the intention of re-selling it in order to buy the stock back at a lower price. That is what shorters do. It is why PLS has circa 20% of its float borrowed for the purpose of short selling.
That is why I call them shorters. That is their investment thesis.
They don't act alone. They require buyers to purchase stock they are selling, meaning people like me have a different view than the shorters.
It's pretty simple to understand, even for someone as smart as you.