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Post by EveningOfTheDay on Dec 22, 2015 14:34:18 GMT -5
I would add that, if I am right, we will simply not see any meaningful amount of covering or relinquishing of pressure on the sp from the short side, since at this point forcing MNKD into a secondary offering could be their only real way out. Of course MNKD and SNY silence does aid them quite a bit at this particular point. I assume MNKD knows this too, hence Matt's odd comment on not allowing shorts to easily unwind their positions.
Yes, MNKD has quite a lot of outstanding shares, but huge portions of it are tied down and unavailable, and out of the float, a reasonable number is in the hands of extremely stubborn longs and tutes that could possibly see the writing on the wall too. Of course I could be wrong on my assessment, but it certainly explains many of the behaviors observed in the sp. It also makes for interesting conversation.
These leads me to believe that the reason we are not hearing anything from MNKD is because they really have little to say at the moment in the form of good news. No aces hidden in the sleeves or anything like that, just a continued chipping at the block in the hope that things will slowly get better. If they can figure out how to get doubts on financing out of the way, that should be a huge victory. Rumors on the niche character of Afrezza, Sanofi's commitment, etc., will continue for as long as RX do not improve considerably, but I think viable financing for MNKD is the quid of the matter at the moment.
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Post by mssciguy on Dec 22, 2015 14:42:37 GMT -5
@eveningoftheday Earlier this morning there was some discussion on ymb (with references!) about firms w/CTOs have an ~90% chance of buyout.
I have no idea of the veracity of those claims with regard to the MNKD/SNY relationship.
As far as conspiracy theories go, well, the MS indictment was full of the word "conspiracy" but there are good conspiracies too... in this case, a legitimate conspiracy of silence.
So I guess "Silent Night" is the theme song this Xmas...
Did you come to the mainland for xmas? It's almost in the 60s here in Indy, crazy. I need to go harvest more greens from the garden, never, ever, harvested this late in the year before! (Important tip: Hybrids are sexier but heirlooms are hardier and probably more nutritious on average).
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Post by bretzyboy on Dec 22, 2015 14:49:29 GMT -5
I don't know if there is a way determine if shorts are or have been covering using options, just that it's possible they have been. In November 150,000 call contracts for Mannkind were traded, just a few less than Amazon and a few more less than Twitter. Pretty high volume considering so something's driving these trades. The volatility is high so using them for speculation wouldn't seem logical. And as a hedge the cost would be steep. Again I don't know, but it has caught my interest as to MNKD's volume v. open interest relationship. Don't get me wrong, I don't think there's a single all or nothing strategy that will be used to cover and there exists a rush to the exits possibilty for some of the shorts.
Scotta, Holding the options has in the risk of premium loss for sure and maybe loss of intrinsic value. If you had a short position of 500,000 shares and it was highly profitable (imagine that) you could have snuck out the back door last Friday by buying 5,000 buck fifty calls, exercising them and covering all in the blink of an eye. It would have cost a substantial amount (to me) in premium value but the net result would've been closing the position at an acceptable price.
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Post by EveningOfTheDay on Dec 22, 2015 15:10:53 GMT -5
@eveningoftheday Earlier this morning there was some discussion on ymb (with references!) about firms w/CTOs have an ~90% chance of buyout. I have no idea of the veracity of those claims with regard to the MNKD/SNY relationship. As far as conspiracy theories go, well, the MS indictment was full of the word "conspiracy" but there are good conspiracies too... in this case, a legitimate conspiracy of silence. So I guess "Silent Night" is the theme song this Xmas... Did you come to the mainland for xmas? It's almost in the 60s here in Indy, crazy. I need to go harvest more greens from the garden, never, ever, harvested this late in the year before! (Important tip: Hybrids are sexier but heirlooms are hardier and probably more nutritious on average). I guess one could put out there the argument that if there is any truth on the fact that those in the short side have better info, they must understand the 90% odds and must be getting a bit nervous. After all Mnkd's silence is not only depriving us longs of info. However, in all honesty, I am a bit tired of speculation. I have no idea what the company will do or not do, but it is possible to use a bit of forensics and try to analyze what is behind us and find explanations that are les speculative, which is, in the absence of news, a pastime. "Silent Night". That is very fitting.  Very fitting too, www.youtube.com/watch?v=n03g8nsaBroremains to be seen who the song applies too, to us longs or to those on the other camp. Not going to the mainland for Xmas, just to another island. I am, once again this year, going to Japan, to Tokyo to be more precise, for New Years. Visiting my lovely partner in crime's family. It is always good for my kids to see cousins, uncles, aunts and grandparents, and Spain is a lot farther and the trip a lot longer. Plus I am always happy to go to Japan, I love it there. Thanks for the gardening tip. Everything we collect is because it just grows, but I have been thinking we need a dedicated vegetable garden, so it is on my list. Mele Kalikimaka Me Ka Hau'oli Makahiki Hou to you and to all in the board. |
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Post by alethea on Dec 22, 2015 15:31:23 GMT -5
I don't know if there is a way determine if shorts are or have been covering using options, just that it's possible they have been. In November 150,000 call contracts for Mannkind were traded, just a few less than Amazon and a few more less than Twitter. Pretty high volume considering so something's driving these trades. The volatility is high so using them for speculation wouldn't seem logical. And as a hedge the cost would be steep. Again I don't know, but it has caught my interest as to MNKD's volume v. open interest relationship. Don't get me wrong, I don't think there's a single all or nothing strategy that will be used to cover and there exists a rush to the exits possibilty for some of the shorts. Scotta, Holding the options has in the risk of premium loss for sure and maybe loss of intrinsic value. If you had a short position of 500,000 shares and it was highly profitable (imagine that) you could have snuck out the back door last Friday by buying 5,000 buck fifty calls, exercising them and covering all in the blink of an eye. It would have cost a substantial amount (to me) in premium value but the net result would've been closing the position at an acceptable price. I don't begin to understand how options work in the real world for the whales of Wall Street. But I was watching MKND on Friday and observed the following volumes. All times EST. At 3:50 pm Total Volume traded was 3.4M shares. Five minutes later it was 3.7M shares. At 3:58, it was 3.97M. At 3:59 and about 50 seconds, it was 4.1M shares. As the clock went from 3:59 to 4:00 pm, Volume was 4.197M shares. Mere seconds later, still during the 4:00 minute volume was 10.9M. Options being exercised? Then, I don't know when exactly, but before 5:00 pm, I saw that now Total Volume was 15.1 Million shares.Now if one goes to look at trading volumes, he might say,"Whoa or wow, 15 M shares traded on Dec 18". But in truth trading volume was quite light that day. Even the 4 M shares traded by 2:58 is deceiving because most of those shares were big lots of 50K, 100K etc, apparently traded by the hedgies amongst themselves, and did not even move the price by more than one penny. So, in essence about 11 million shares traded AFTER the market closed. Does this kind of activity allow the manipulating hedgies to cover en masse? |
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Post by traderdennis on Dec 22, 2015 15:36:07 GMT -5
Enough people selling for tax losses and possibly an institution liquidating a position with those shorts covering. But enough would have to equal one third of outstanding shares. If insiders have a little less than half and institutions have 1/3 where is that third coming from? (forgive the rounding please) Afrizzle, no one is saying all of the shares have covered, but it looks like they are starting to cover. Last report is 110MM shares are shorted as of about 11/28 ish down from a high of 127MM or about 13%. The share price on 11/28 was around 2.15 give or take a few pennies. Thursday December 10th, the price ranged from the 1 forties to close at 1.70. My guess is that at least another 15MM shares will have covered and we will see about 95MM shares reported shorted outstanding. Just to note, the short report only takes into account transactions that have cleared. So the price would be based on the closing price t+3 for equity trades and t+1 for options. 125MM to 95MM would be a substantial portion of the short float covering. It may bring a small short squeeze back into the two's, but I would imagine if the price goes up too high $2.25 or greater a new short attack will be launched. rinse and repeat. |
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Post by me on Dec 22, 2015 15:53:58 GMT -5
Some posters have often argued that calls will allow shorts to unwind their positions, but I have not seen yet the necessary math by which this would be possible. I think most of the volume we see is the same shares trading back and forth, back and forth. Mostly phantom volume. As I have stated before, (I fully agree with JPG here) only an outcome where bankruptcy or where longs start dumping their shares massively will allow for any shorts to cover. I do not think there are any other mathematically viable possibilities here. Covering for some of the shorts, sure. Covering of the oversized short position, simply no. I am very curious as to who will be left standing in this game of musical chairs. On the other hand the longer we go without news and the further down shorts push the sp, the more long give up on the stock and more shares become available for covering. Perhaps that is the reason the sp is been pushed down at present so hard down. Comes January, either it will be clear that Sanofi is here to stay (which I firmly believe), or Sanofi might leave and there will be a massacre an easy way out for shorts. The unfortunate news for longs is that even ir it is clear Sanofi is sticking around, and even if the sp bounces a bit, it could potentially stay depressed for quite a while, as long as neither Mannkind or Sanofi are willing to share a bit more of their plans on how to make Afrezza a success, and as long as we do not get a good idea on how Mannkind will manage to stay afloat. By the way, are there any longs in the board that have tried to buy large amounts of shares lately? Say several thousand. If so, were there any trouble having orders fill? Thanks. I did last week, 6,000 shares, I took five lots to fill it. Back on 12/10 when the price was cratering, it still took me four lots to fill 9000 shares at least an hour before the price turned up. I just don't understand how that can happen. |
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