Banter and General Comments, page-4734

Thanks for the clarifying aspects of hedging of institutional holdings.
If the current short positions are largely institutional hedging against a company-specific risk (GXY) or sector-wide risk (lithium), then why did they increase to current levels that late in GXY corporate history. GXY was much riskier before joining forces with GMM, after T/O of GMM and ramp up of MC. It had $40Mil debt, SDV and JB were undrilled patches of dirt and MC had an estimated mine life of less than 10 years. The major holder notifications indicate that Black Rock, New York Life and Ausbil came on board during late 2018 when the oversupply BS was in full swing but no institutional holder left. Every step on the way since then, GXY company-specific risks were reduced and the underlying long term fundamentals grew stronger by the month.
So in simple words, why did the shorts increase if they are largely an instrument of hedging of institutional long term holdings? According to Simply Wall Street, 60% of GXY belong to retail in Jan 2019 (https://simplywall.st/stocks/au/mat...sources-limiteds-asxgxy-shareholder-register/). I believe some big boys entered GXY late in 2018 and started playing games to increase their positions by fleecing retail on the back of the oversupply BS that was peddled by MacBank/MS.
I wonder what the retail figure is now? I bet it is less than 60% and that some institutional holders are sitting just under 5% and off the radar. On the flip side, if $2 is a strong support level (as shown over the last few weeks), the current shorts are very risky to hold and the reverse can happen anytime to the SP and the short position.
Anyway, in the long term this is only noise. If you can stomach to watch these manipulations to pass and sit it out until common sense catches up with the fundamentals, GXY and other oversold Li suppliers are a safe bet in the long term (IMHO and according to the largest shareholders).
GLTA