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Tin,
With regard to your 1st point, there were 1 million shares which traded between 22.14 and 14.08 that day during the crash, while 1.8 million shares traded on the way back up to 22. The effort was clearly to take out the stop loss tickets and benefit from intraday trading (why not), and then pick up buyers on the way up to 22, which only helped during the subsequent shorting phase (between September 17 and October 2, 2015, the stock went from 19.62 to 10.52, before falling further upon news of the hold).
I don't think you are disagreeing with me about the fact that there are crooked short funds, illegally trading on inside info, although you have a conspiracy theory about the end game, which includes management.
Phyto, it makes zero sense when people deny short manipulation. The evidence is all there right in front of their eyes but they refuse to acknowledge it.
Now I've always agreed that ADXS has made certain missteps in communication and in not striking enough accretive deals. But the shorts and their spokespeople admit to no reasonable argument. If ADXS were trading at cash value, as it almost is, they still argue that it is trading $2 too high.
I'll leave it everyone's judgment to conclude who makes sense here.
Steve, I prefer to explain ADXS-specific manipulation using a well known event. There is constant manipulation going on in this stock but in order to observe it you would have to watch level 2.
Anyway, on September 17, 2015, ADXS released their best ever GOG phase 2 cervical data of 38.5% 1 year OS (even you would agree that this is not an opinion but an objective fact). The PR for it came in at 2:05 PM. Within a couple minutes of the PR being issued, the stock flash crashed from 22.14 to 14.08 and then back to 22, all within 5 minutes. The stock ended that day at 19.62.
I have a few questions for you to ponder:
1. Who crashed the stock and brought it back up in minutes? I am confident you would agree that it's not retail.
2. The result itself was stellar, and it was better than that of any other study in 50 years of trials by GOG; so why did they crash it. Well, we now know that 15 days after this data release, on October 2, a clinical hold was placed on ADXS' trials due to a patient's death. But how did the flash crashers know this info before the company or FDA released the information? Well, they did receive inside information well ahead of time and used HFT to crash the stock 15 days in advance. Would you dispute this?
3. When your say there is no manipulation, are you saying that the entities that manipulated the stock in September 17, 2015 simply walked away after that day for all of eternity, with no additional interest in the stock?
Think about these to begin with.
Tin, it's funny that in 2 months you have posted more than twice as much as I have in about 1 year. I bet more than half your posts were spent promoting a criminal conspiracy by the ADXS BOD. By the way, are you still confident in that '10M shares at $5' theory?
Anyway, I would be lying if I didn't say that I rather enjoyed your nuclear radiation analogy, although I would prefer to not have it applied to me. But keep going, fight the bad fight; if nothing else you have made the board more interesting.
I too noticed the short volume vs downward movement you are referring to, Gantor. But the problem is that when people are being willfully ignorant, there is hardly anything you can say to make them see the facts, even when they are available to see in plain sight. There are many here who still think SP manipulation is just a theory.
Well said, Ig. It appears that some here have become so scared of the SP manipulation that they have also become immune to reason and observation. If it provides them any comfort, I think the capitulation of the last few days has brought the short manipulation closer to an ending, at least in this price range. I think the short report of 10/10 will indicate significant covering of the short position.
Gantor, I doubt that tomorrow's short interest report will provide comfort to longs. If anything the short volume will go up. But that is by design.
All of the major covering started on 09/16, intentionally, to hide the covering activity until around 10/10. It just gives them more time to scare up longs and do their thing. They are playing longs for rubes. Hard to argue they didn't succeed.
Longs: Stop being depressed about the share price. This senseless crash is artificially being imposed using HFT. Notice what's happening right under your feet; you are being deceived into believing that something terrible is happening while short funds are stealing shares and covering. At least be inspired enough to install L2 and check. Another huge block of 170k shares bought/covered at 1:30 (42.5K + 127.5K).
Fbg, I don't know how the buying/covering is not being observed by more people. The stock is a screaming buy at this point and has been when it was in 7s and 8s. The entire focus of the short funds right now is to take out every last stop loss, margin sale and mutual fund share drop. These short funds and MMs are vile manipulators but they are not stupid in the least bit.
Here's how the uptrend will begin: ADXS PRs a partner shortly and the stock takes off. Subsequently, the same short funds who will have covered in the $4-6 range will get their lackeys in the investment media to write positive pieces on ADXS out of nowhere. ADXS will reach new highs. Whether it will sustain there depends on additional developments with regard to the company's progress over the next few months. But many longs I suspect will sell out this time; you know being having been super hurt over the last 2.5 years.
Anyone who thinks there is "free market" trading of ADXS going on is delusional. Massive blocks of ADXS shares are being bought/covered in evidently pre-arranged transactions by vested interests, both MMs and Hedgies. Notice that the price doesn't move a cent after these big block trades (see trades at 10:27 and 10:28 (125k purchase).
You can either be in on the joke or the subject of it. If you know anything about this company's current position, I doubt that it would make any sense to you that it is being pushed down even at 4.50.
Frustrated longs here should stop with this expectation that Monday is some sort of binary event. The company didn't promise any new data or partnership at the Cantor event. While I will be certainly be happy to see positive material news, there was no promise by the company regarding it and therefore no guarantee that it will be reported.
I can see why shorts want to make this a binary event, but longs should know that this is a trap. If the company releases material news, it will be a surprise, not a promise delivered. If longs themselves think that for every week that goes by without news the stock should fall 40% from wherever it is, then the HFT shorts will be glad to fulfill that expectation.
Raja, I'm not endorsing every act of omission or commission by management. All I am doing is refusing to endorse the manipulation of the SP to comical (but also tragic) levels. The short hedge fund reaction to every supposed inaction by ADXS management is to try and destroy the share price unreasonably. It has never been a free market reaction and I think you know this. Since SP is the primary cause of disgruntlement, longs should not do anything to feed the panic here, which hurts their own interests, to whatever extent it may be.
I see no contradiction between calling out management's errors when they happen and disapproving the insane SP manipulation that is happening everyday.
ADXS has very strong science based on data released to date. But I would also admit that the current CEO has not proven himself yet. Both the previous and current CEOs have made communication errors, although Dan also erred in not licensing out a product for major upfront cash. But it is a correctable error and I foresee Lombardo acting on it soon.
Where I disagree strongly is the argument that the SP of ADXS deserves to be at the current level or lower because of these errors. Also, while HFT short funds will certainly make every attempt to take this stock down even lower, there is no reason to justify or endorse that attempt.
Have you ever noticed that shorts always say good news or potential milestones are always baked into the SP when a stock is up in anticipation of something positive, while simultaneously arguing that a stock needs to go lower for the same reason multiple times? That is what is happening here. No price is low enough for them to manipulate more.
Let's see what the next week unfolds.
But not all phase 3 companies have an SPA from the FDA and ATMP from the EMA for their lead product. Not all companies have the best ever phase 2 data, reported by an independent agency, for said product. Besides, nobody is saying that ADXS deserves to "roll in money" based on these facts, just that it doesn't deserve to go down to the $3 range, as your original post suggested.
I brought up the number of people reading the board as a cautionary point, to consider minimizing exaggerations and compromising one's credibility, not because it impacts the PPS in any way.
I really don't know. Companies sometimes formalize deals at the last minute before they PR it, in order to retain the element of surprise. Clearly, the AMGN deal last year cane out of nowhere and surprised everyone. On the other hand, regulatory updates cannot be timed beyond 3 days by any company.
In any case, all I'm trying to say here is, whether or not we have material news on Monday, that excuse has already been used beyond the point of absurdity to take ADXS' stock down. It makes no sense to want to use it again within a week. But some supposed longs here think that that makes abundant sense.
Maple, I understand the frustration but quite honestly only the last two words of your post are justified, considering the shorts' trading tactics.
Who is pumping here? I don't see a single long making unreasonable predictions based on incoherent arguments. Do you see shouts of 'To the moon!!' or '100 by December!!' here? Merely pointing out that the stock does not deserve to be at the current levels is not pumping. You have certain supposedly disgruntled longs saying here that we deserve to go to the 3s next week, unless material news updates are provided on Monday. Think of it as the trading version of 'double jeopardy' in reverse, where we are supposed to be punished twice for the same crime (or omission in this case) of not providing material news. Not that I think the 40% SP take down was justified at all, but if you do, what was the reason?
Frustrations are high and the stock price is depressing to say the least but things at the company are not remotely as bad as they are being portrayed by some.
What does the founding date of ADXS, whether 10 or 15 years ago, have anything to do with your case that its stock price would be right to go down to the 3s next week? Any stock trades, or is supposed to trade, based on its current reality. It shouldn't have to undergo unjustified takedowns merely because the company has not providing material positive news, which shorts have already used as a reason to beat it down 40% over the last 7 trading days from an already depressed price.
Your list of grievances (or excuses, depending on your trading side), some of which are clearly inaccurate, totally fail to support the premise of your previous post. By the way, the company has nothing to show for its existence, huh? Not even a phase 3 with SPA and ATMP or the best ever GOG results in cervical cancer? There are a lot of people reading this board, so you might want to tone down the exaggerations a bit.
Just trying to understand your logic at this point. Every time the company plans to provide an update at a conference or in a filing, they had better strike a monetary partnership or release great material news. If not, the shorts are right to take the stock down by 40-50%, regardless of where it is already priced. Sounds logical, right? Let's take this down to 3 dollars, which is slightly above the value of cash on hand plus assets, thereby assigning a grand value of $0.25-$0.50 to the entire platform. All positives and future potential is completely baked in, absolutely none of the uncertainty is. Awesome!
ADXS management has certainly made a series of communication mistakes recently (investor day PR and update, HER2 confusion) and some errors of omission (not yet securing a major licensing deal. But none of it was worth a 40% beat down from what was an already absurd $7.41 share price (right before the current short attack). And to think that the company must go even lower, simply for not providing any additional material information right after this beat down is short logic at its finest.
gbrown, I agree a 100%. I don't see a HFT resolution that is fair to the average investor and punitive to the manipulators anytime soon.
That's a good idea, Tin. But the problem is that the brokerages and MMs themselves have hedge fund divisions, so they are not going to charge themselves a fee. If the government is the one that should charge a fee, it would add an additional layer of bureaucratic intrusion, which of course would be subject to further lobbying and neutralization by vested interests. However, I do agree with you that imposing a fee per trade would somewhat curb this current monstrosity.
Also, Hillary Clinton's campaign had included precisely this kind of a fee on HFT firms in her financial policy agenda, although I seriously doubt that she would have actually gone ahead with it. Trump mentioned something about imposing higher taxes on hedge fund managers although nothing about HFT. I doubt that he knows enough about HFT anyway.
The biggest problem is that only 3% of Americans actively manage their portfolios and only a tiny fraction within that percentage understands HFT. So there is no public pressure on the topic that lawmakers have to deal with, and on the contrary, they get paid to ignore its existence. But some big companies and billionaires are also getting hurt (Steven Wynn and Mark Cuban have spoken out) and I hope this ends up in the courts.
Agreed, Ig. But HFT's advantage of transactional speed must be the central argument to outlaw it. While the manipulative algos are indeed the primary cause of the damage, the high speed allows them to implement that manipulation instantly and at will. In other words, the algos are an expression of business intent.
However, proving manipulative intent and action, or regulating them at the level of individual trades, is pretty much impossible. The only workable solution is to outlaw it on the grounds of creating unequal market access. To be sure, the case for outlawing HFT can actually be taken to the courts as well, but it will take much longer, and someone with truly deep pockets, to fight it out.
I agree. Also, I doubt that any more than a small fraction of the buys are from new buyers.
The shock and awe pull down strategy has scared away a good percentage of existing and potential longs from buying and consequently funds (presumably short) appear to be capturing a vast majority of the margin shares and mutual fund threshold (under 5) shares that got shaken down.
A sizable amount of buying/short covering (hard to say which) is going on today without causing any price bump. If you don't have L2 you can still check it out on NASDAQ real time trades. I do think it is short covering though, as margin sales are still in progress, thanks to the stock being under $5.
It is called analysis based on close observation, not some wild conjecture. The analysis follows basic rules of trading, in addition to multi-year activity by shorts with respect to ADXS.
Just as longs sell once a stock goes up quickly and the technical indicators seem over extended, shorts cover to the extent possible once they foresee limited gains on the downside. And with ADXS specifically, HFT has been used as a relentless weapon. Even anecdotal observation on L2 will show you this (like a slap in anyone's face, it just cannot be missed).
In any case, feel free to call it conjecture, it doesn't bother me.
Lorema,
I saw the sells as well. In between the HFT trades and the actual buys/sells, the MMs are accumulating the sell side shares and packaging them so that the short hedge funds can buy them in similarly large blocks and cover. But as you said, the price movements either up or down are only happening due to 100 share HFT trades and nothing else.
Another 50K block purchase at 4.99 at 15:35:57 (which, of course, didn't move the price by a cent). The MMs and hedgies aren't done mining the margin sales and mutual fund share dropoffs under $5 yet. There is significant covering going on but, as Ig pointed out this morning, it won't be reflected in the next short report around 09/24.
If this is not the dictionary definition of spreading FUD I don't know what is. R/S, followed by secondary? It should be clear to any retail long that the short funds brought this down below $5 using HFT, and are keeping it there, so that they could spread these kind of scare mongering scenarios. Of course, besides inducing forced selling.
Beware of the morally nihilistic characters who think nothing of stealing investments from others and leaving them in the financial gutter.
Jeez man, your theory is literally a plot for a crime based movie. If I were to completely suspend disbelief and agree with your assumptions, each more unlikely than the last, then yes, the theory is plausible.
But I am sure that you have heard of Occam's Razor. It generally provides good guidance when you have competing hypotheses. I do prefer to go with the short hypothesis that requires me to make the fewest assumptions. It is also likely to spare everyone involved a prison sentence.
Here's my non-conspiratorial theory: The shorts want to cover their position, which they initiated massively in mid-2015 based on inside (and illegal) knowledge of a patient's death in the GOG phase 2 study, in as low and narrow a price range as possible. However, they are unable to do so, as they keep running into resistance from a highly knowledgeable and stubborn retail base (the volume and quality of posts on this board being evidence).
I want to add that I have never seen this kind of continuity of retail shareholding or activism on any other biotech message board in the last 10 years (except may be Mannkind), especially considering that the stock price has been rendered completely incongruent with investor belief and expectation. The share price is trapped due to this standoff between shorts and longs but the former obviously enjoy a massive upper hand due to their access to HFT.
The end game: Given that retail longs are not abandoning ship even below $5 (there isn't that much room to go lower) and I don't see any major institutional selling, if at all, or sufficient short covering yet, I only see one possibility. A grudging HFT-controlled partial, slow covering from shorts when material news is released, assuming that it will happen in the near term. I think it will. But for shorts to drastically reduce their short position, the company will have to come up with a huge cluster of monstrously positive material news with no room for misinterpretation.
Just to add to this discussion, I code for a living. I can almost guarantee that not a single member of congress or their staffers would understand remotely as to how HFT or trading algorithms work or how the underlying trading rules are set. To be honest, they shouldn't have to since no one knows enough about everything.
Anytime that government tries to regulate at the level of detail on any issue, private industry gains the upper hand as almost all the subject matter experts are on their side. Now, regulating at the level of detail is unavoidable in most industries that are necessary for everyone's benefit(food and medicine, infrastructure and many others) and the government can try the best it can.
But the hedge fund/market making industry is not a necessity. Sure, they have the right to exist just like all other companies, and have the right to make money legally as much as anyone. But they can easily be prevented from indulging in certain practices, like HFT, altogether since there is no "transaction" here in the traditional sense. They are simply participating in a transactional chain where only the middlemen (MMs) make money and both the actual seller (say ADXS) and buyers (actual investors) lose. Not to mention the primary argument of hedge funds using HFT to create and amplify unequal access to the market.
Creating liquidity for the market (an amorphous group of unknown individuals) is a dubious claim at best but is complete drivel in reality. HFT trading algorithms are coded by the brightest software engineers and the rules underlying them are written by the smartest business experts. There is no way anyone in government can regulate it at the level of detail, in a manner that would be "fair" to everyone. Its existence needs to be ended.
The sad news is that it will never happen.
Nobody should be surprised if the shorts HFTs keep this below $5 for a few days. They are forcing selling from margin holders and certain mutual funds that drop stocks below $5.
Yep. I find it funny that some are blaming Justice and Equality. Everything he said about the science was accurate and like a free science ed class. While he was inaccurate in predicting timelines for certain approvals/regulatory milestones, he was guessing just like everyone else. I doubt he could've predicted the clinical hold or certain management choices. I wish he had a stronger constitution to stay around and still post but he appeared too academic and dignified to allow himself to be called names on a message board.
Team pump? Who exactly is pumping? Some longs are anxious but steady, some are totally distraught and the rest, including Ignatius, are simply providing a rationale to hold and/or buy.
And no, not buying a severely undervalued stock (if you can afford to) is not a strategy to help your own interest. Especially ADXS under $5.
One thing that is ticking off short hedge funds is this: ADXS retail longs are unusually well educated about their investment and are not willing to let go no matter what they try; writing disingenuous yahoo and Seeking Alpha articles, using incessant HFT suppression, spreading FUD on message boards etc. The only types of retail sellers are day traders and longs selling involuntarily (due to stop losses and margin holdings).
Bad news for them: this won't last long. And they seem to know it.
I tend to agree with your assessment here, fbg. Also, if Lombardo will continue to make the same kind of light upfront/ heavy back loaded deals, I see very little reason to have canned DOC. Unless we suddenly have to think that his deal making style or ability, laden with built-in risk, wasn't the reason that he was fired and he went away for something else altogether. But many here, including James, have confirmed that he left involuntarily, presumably due to differences with the BOD on strategy.
I do hope that the new deal making style includes heavy infusion of cash upfront, with no equity for the partner, at least for ONE product/franchise. And I too am not sure which part of the business update suggests otherwise.
Ig, you are right about the short funds not wanting a buyout at all, regardless of price, as they would then be inescapably trapped. I had not thought of that. It is unlikely to happen anyway given where the SP is.
Like you said, it appears they have a small (unknown) window to get out of their positions. They are hoping their "shock and awe" strategy of the last few days may bear some result. I wouldn't mind it if they can cover whatever percentage of their short position in this price range as we need them off our backs if possible. I doubt that they can cover more than 3-4 million even in the 4s. They may have to cover the rest higher, but from their perspective the low base can't hurt.
I guess it would only be the retail shorts who will truly get burned when the partnership news releases.
One thing seems pretty certain, Gantor. Raising capital from the market, assuming ADXS wants to in the short term, is out of the question given where the short funds have brought it down to.
Also, we now know that the there are only two ways to take the share price up, which ADXS' PR has repeatedly said is management's goal. Either by striking a huge monetary partnership or by selling the company. I still think a partnership is much more likely, first, followed by a sale.
I think the short funds know this and will cover whatever they can before news comes out.
Thanks for sharing this. To be honest, the indifference to their own culpability in hurting or destroying companies doesn't surprise me at all. Since everything they do is implemented by algos (which simply run off of built in rules coded by tech guys), they get to take away the human element from decision making, besides the fact that everything they do happens in micro seconds.
The only way out of this mess is for Congress to outlaw HFT (under the valid free market principle of preventing and overcoming unequal access to participants) and get institutions and funds to declare short positions just the same as long positions, in addition to reporting much more frequently.
Unfortunately, I have ZERO confidence that either Congress or the executive branch, regardless of who is in power, will ever do the above. The hedge fund industry will fight using their last penny to prevent this from happening.
Gantor, I think they will cover this time around (as much as they can) considering the cluster of anticipated events over the next several months. However, if they do not cover at even 5 or lower, it will be clear that the short cabal's goal is not merely to profit from their short position but to meet some other objectives, such as forcing the sale of this company at an undesirable price for longs.
I doubt that they will succeed as I think a significant monetary partnership is very close to fruition. We just have to wait and see.
Good to know, which means there won't be too many retail shares to shake below 5; well at least not based on margin calls.
The other short play might be to get mutual funds to drop ADXS since many have rules on having stocks below $5 in their portfolio.
In any case, it should be clear to anyone with at least 2 brain cells that this is not a "free market reaction" to events that transpired at ADXS. This is just use of crooked means and the brute force of HFT to hurt a small cap biotech.
I am watching L2 and I do see a sizable amount of induced selling as well as buying/short covering.
If I had to guess, the hedge fund shorts will take this into the 4s and keep it there a few days. This will induce a whole bunch of selling as ADXS will become non-marginable under 5 (as will any stock for most brokers). That will provide a good opportunity to cover a decent chunk of the short interest. I hope not many longs here are on margin.
I want to add that if AXAL-DUAL ends up getting licensed, I believe US rights will be a part of it. That will entirely change the dynamics of the upfront payment and the royalties. But if HER2 is what Lombardo ends up licensing I have no earthly idea as to what it is worth. How someone here has a better idea of the market value for licensing.