Activist short-sellers are increasingly targeting Canadian companies — is Canada ready?
Barbara Shecter, 06 OCtober 2017
Early on the morning of May 31, San Francisco-based short-selling firm Muddy Waters LLC, best known in this country for the short report that toppled stock market darling Sino-Forest Corp. in 2011, posted a tantalizing message on the firm’s Twitter account.
“Good morning, Canada! MW is about to release a new short that we think is on its way to Zero,” the tweet read.
A while later, traders at RBC Capital Markets in downtown Toronto were among those who watched their screens in shock as shares of a Canadian leasing company called Element Fleet Management, began to plunge, and continued to fall until they had lost around 40 per cent of their value.
There was only one problem: Element, despite social media speculation, wasn’t the company Muddy Waters was targeting.
