I did a double-take when I saw the number.
Fails to deliver in shares of AMC Entertainment Holdings Inc. passed 2.6 million in June. The report, released today by the Securities and Exchange Commission, covers the first half of the month.
Fails to deliver hit 2,653,787 on June 3 before settling at 1,231,742 at the end of the reporting period. Fails to deliver topped 1 million numerous times.
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I’ve been writing about this topic for about a year, and I can’t recall ever seeing a figure so massive. This despite a long history of large fails to deliver in this stock.
AMC’s fails to deliver are way out of line with other stocks. Here are the numbers on the same day for several companies dramatically larger than AMC:
Amazon: 0
Microsoft: 0
Tesla: 24,983
But let’s back up a second: what is a fail to deliver? A fail to deliver occurs when a trade is made but is never finalized.
Now why might a stock like AMC have a pattern of large and persistent fails to deliver? A common reason is naked short selling.
To sell a stock short, you must borrow shares and sell them. Naked shorting is the generally illegal practice of selling short shares you never borrowed.
This is a powerful way to push down a stock’s price.
If you naked short, there’s no limit to the number of shares you can short. After all, you never had to find any to borrow!
Huge numbers of trades have failed in this stock for at least a year. Despite this, the SEC has not investigated these irregularities.
I keep coming back to this topic because I’m amazed at the inaction. Why not find out why the market in this stock is functioning so poorly?
I hope exchanges and regulators dive into this topic right away. We need orderly and fair capital markets for our country to thrive.
What do you think is causing these failed trades? Leave a comment at the bottom and let me know.
More on markets:
Hedge Fund Giant Tiger Global Losing $28 Million an Hour
$6B Hedge Fund Cut Off from Trading As Investigation Looms
Hedge Funds Could Lose Nearly Half of Assets Under Proposed SEC Rule
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