In my layman's ignorance, I assume that Friday's action would have included a whole bunch of cross trades between short funds. I also assume that a cross trade is, at best, only a nominal buy back of shorted stock. In other words, paper was shuffled to push the share price down which, in turn, then facilitates a "real" buyback at a lower price.
I dont have access to such information so I am really only guessing. However, it does seem to be a strategy successfully used in the past to enable to closing of short positions and an orderly exit.
The real question is, however, is such "trading" essentially collusive. If the answer is yes then why is ASIC so totally inept at challenging such (obvious) arrangements? Irrespectively, it is a tough (and unregulated) game for we retail shareholders. It's a shame that long funds don't call the bluff of shorters by buying up "bigly" to challenge the shorters. We can only look forward to future positive announcements and a strong 4th quarter result. GLTAH Keith
BOE Price at posting:
$3.72 Sentiment: Hold Disclosure: Held
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