While high-flying AI stocks have grabbed much of the spotlight recently, gold miners, quantum computing and crypto equities have also enjoyed some spectacular gains.
Short-sellers are now making bets that some of those gains are overdone. In a number of cases, short-sellers are even betting against stocks with high insider commitment, which is setting up a high-stakes contest.
On the gold-mining front, short-sellers upped their bets against Centerra Gold CG-T to just over 5.9 million shares shorted as of Sept. 30, or about 3 per cent of the stock’s float. That represented an increase of more than 1.9 million shares since Sept. 15.
Centerra operates the Oksut gold mine in Turkey and the Mount Milligan mine in B.C. The company’s Mount Milligan life-extension project has been designated by the province as a priority project. The bulging short bets took place even as insiders were buying Centerra stock in the public market.
Since Sept. 16, four Centerra insiders bought a total of 18,550 shares at an average price of $13.11. Centerra was making four-year highs in September, and it is normally a bullish signal when insiders are buying into such strength. The buying helped generate an INK short-squeeze setup signal, and as it turned out, the stock’s bull run has continued, setting new four-year highs in early October.
Insiders buy and hold high-flying NameSilo Technologies
Short-sellers of BTQ Technologies BTQ-NE shares are also on the back foot early this month after boosting their bets against the stock at the end of September. Short interest jumped by just over 1.6 million shares in the Sept. 30 report provided by the Canadian Investment Regulatory Organization. That left 2.3 million shares shorted as of month-end, an estimated 2.5 per cent of the stock’s float.
BTQ is focusing on developing products for the period after quantum computing has advanced to the point where it can rapidly break existing encryption schemes. Key products include Quantum Computation in Memory (QCIM), which BTQ describes as a security-hardened processor designed to run any cryptographic algorithm, and its Quantum-Secure Stablecoin Settlement Network (QSSN) to facilitate secure payments.
BTQ is led by CEO Olivier Roussy Newton who is the co-founder of crypto-exchange products provider DeFi Technologies DEFI-NE and is a former director of HIVE Blockchain Technologies, now HIVE Digital Technologies HIVE-X. In May and June, he spent just over $1.7-million buying 417,500 shares at an average price of $4.13. We have seen some subsequent insider selling at the company, but he was not one of the sellers. He now holds just over 42.5 million shares representing 30.7 per cent of all shares outstanding.
It remains to be seen how the quantum-computing space evolves in the years ahead, but BTQ’s share price has made a quantum leap forward since the end of September. After a brief dip, it is up 99 per cent this month as of Tuesday. The stock also has a short-squeeze setup signal, but we will be watching to see if any insider profit-taking emerges in the days ahead, which could potentially change the signal to a bearish reading later this month.
ARC Resources’ insiders bought the late summer dip
With the Federal Reserve back on the rate-cutting path and the Trump administration adopting a pro-crypto regulatory approach, stocks that hold cryptocurrencies on their balance sheets have attracted some investor attention.
SOL Strategies HODL-CN has been building its holdings of the Solana cryptocurrency to 435,064 SOL tokens as of Sept. 16. The company also manages and operates validator nodes on the Solana network. On Sept. 24, it announced an upsized listed issuer financing exemption offering of units worth up to $30-million in gross proceeds.
The offering closed on Oct. 1 and consisted of 4,380,000 units at $6.85 a unit. Each unit consisted of one common share and one common share purchase warrant exercisable at $8.90 for a period of 36 months from closing. SOL Strategies will use the proceeds to expand its treasury, including purchasing more Solana tokens.
Meanwhile, during September, the number of SOL Strategies shares shorted jumped by more than 1.3 million shares to stand at almost 1.7 million shares as of Sept. 30. The stock has slid 1.7 per cent so far this month as of Tuesday.
However, insiders have been buying the pullback. Three insiders have spent a total of just over $1.4-million so far in October, buying shares in the public market. The biggest insider buyer in October was Tony Guoga who bought 200,000 shares on Oct. 2 at $6.27.
Ted Dixon is CEO of INK Research which provides insider news and knowledge to investors.