We are independent
activist short-sellers, past and present.
We believe in short
activism: intelligent and well-incentivized investors are more likely to find
instances of financial wrongdoing than are thinly-stretched government
employees at the SEC’s Division of Enforcement.
We also believe that the
activist space has become too crowded, and that low-quality publishers are
free-riding on the credibility built up by good and honest activists over the
past decade.
The sell-side reports
issued in response to activist research are typically cursory, uninformative,
and lacking in credibility to the investing public as non-independent evaluations of short-sellers’ work.
Yet not all investors
have the time, stamina, or requisite level of sophistication to evaluate the
claims made by activist short-sellers – much less within the timeframe required
to respond to an activist report.
We, as seasoned
short-sellers, understand the work that goes into constructing an honest and
credible activist short report.
But just as we understand
the financial games that some companies play to give the appearance of strong
performance, we also understand the tactics used by some short-sellers to
manufacture an influential short case.
We intend to publish
responses to short reports which we believe to be flawed, in the interest of
policing the activist space against low-quality reports and protecting the
honest short-sellers whose collective credibility they threaten.