After looking into some of the DD that had been published in the last days i decided to take a look into the Short Data and FTD data to find out if this stock behaves like a delisted stock or if the allegations made by some of the authors could be true – just by looking at the FTD Data and Short Data that is available to us/the public.
Lets start with the basical facts:
Sears first got my attention back in June because of his tweet – but i had no idea what and where to look at.
Sears was delisted on 24. October 2018.
Before, it had been traded unter the Ticker SHLD – since the 24. it is traded unter the Ticker SHLDQ.
Lets first take a look at the long timeframe for SEARS.
As you see, the FTD spiked exatly the the day after the delisting of sears. While we still got hugh ftd in 2021. Strange, right?
2010 looks nice, lets move way deeper into the past:
Oh – 2008 says hello! Anyone has an idea why SOOOO many shares could fail? 😉
So, lets take a look into the Time AFTER it got delisted – It should not have any real short activities, its a dead company so never mind! Oh. it has a volume. And a short Volume. And it reports a short volume.
This is the Volume (Blue) and Short Volume (Orange) since Sears got delisted.
How much did shortsellers make by shortselling a dead company over and over again after the delisting – you will say, some pennys. Yeah, some pennies if you are a hedgefund manager. But for us its a lot money.
To calculate the “short sell gaines”/how much money did they make by just shortselling a dead company:
In Words one hundret fifty six million four hundret eighty two thousend threehundret fifty nine $ and 86 Cents by selling a company short that is delisted.
Yeah, you are reading it right. Since the stock got gelisted and was trading below 1$ Shortseller Sold between 24. Oct 2018 and 02. August 2021
First: Amount of Shares Sold Short / Total Volume Reported in Short Data
Strangest thing so far i found further in the data is the SVR Total VOL = SHORT VOLUME / ( YAHOO EOD VOL / 100 ) = Short Volume Ratio Total EOD Vol – Describes the % of shares shorted of total daily vol.Lets agree an the fact that 100% is max. But we got this for Jan 2019 – That is strange that the short volume reported in shortdata exeeds the volume reported on yahoo.
Taking this one day out and scaling it down to a 0-100% y containing Closing Price (Orange), Blue SVR Total Vol and the 40 days moving average. This doesnt look like a dead stock….
And what about the FTD?
24. Oct 2018 Till last FTD Update
Same Chart, but starting at 01. January 2019
A dead Stock still has FTD over FTD over FTD over time. WHAT IS THIS – A Zombie stock?
I think this needs some more research – thank you for your time! I think we should dig into this rabbit hole!
Added:
There are still people holding SEARS in 2021- take a look: 1. KINETICS PORTFOLIOS TRUST 2. FAIRHOLME FUNDS INC 3. Invesco Exchange-Traded Fund Trust II 4. KINETICS MUTUAL FUNDS INC bonds?????
Add 2:
