Tryn2, You are exactly right. With regulatory approval coming soon, there is only one reality. Real investors are buying.
Short positions are "mark-to-market" financial liabilities that will blow up in the MMs and their minion's hands. This daily stock price manipulation is temporary and not substance. It's only last-incremental-share traded value. Any news and price does a step change up in the morning.
No amount of manipulating stats will change this (# shares available to short, wash trading, borrow/lend games, and shifting shares between naked / legal short buckets). Real retail shareholders are not selling. If anything, they are buying, maybe even concentrating. That is the substance of the situation. It is the reality of retail investor's due diligence, confidence in regulatory approval, and in knowing it is this period right before approval that MMs will act most desperately.
Bullish