you may be right that there may be something else loomimg. The Feb puts are extraordinarily high both in volume and price and outpace calls by a factor of 2 to 10. Even Feb 10 puts traded with over 2000 contracts @ 1.20 with a break even at $8.80 share price! Feb 12.5 puts traded with about 8K contracts (=800K shares) and a closing price of $2.4. That's an insane bet.
To me this looks however like a dead-cat bounce considering the ridiculous arguments and methods used. Rehash of old arguments that nobody believes any more: missing stores, SAIC based tax issues, lie about bulk customers... using a hastily written and poorly translated chinese article. What I smell is Waldo and his shorty buddies have their back now against the wall with their millions of CCME shares short/naked short about to be forced-buy-in in a matter of days. You are talking about an armageddon. Shorts will need $50-100MM in cash to cover the 5MM+ shares within a week or so as CCME is already on RegSho Day 4. They desperately need to come up with quick cash and will not shy from any quick-and-dirty coup to save their a**. The high put volume reminds me much of what happened back in August a few days before Citron released their attack on CHBT: thousands of puts were bought. The stock indeed tanked from $15 to about $8 within weeks thereafter and shorts made tons of money. But that was in September. Do they really believe that they can repeat that act this time? When you are in a black hole, you'll do anything to get out. That's how I see it.
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