Thread,
The below is guesswork on my part, but I may have an explanation for the volume.
Market Maker activity Oct Nov Dec Year
Mayer & Schweitzer 189,182 113,724 95,515 1.267M
Knight Securities 68,590 123,568 89,701 .569M
Paine Webber 71,612 73,150 68,688 1.023M
Troster Singer Corp. 166,376 35,870 54,860 .900M
*Herzog, Heine, Gedold *450,298 110,027 29,997 1.445M
Presume that someone (hedge fund?) was forced to quickly (NOW!) sell a
large block in October. There would not be that many buyers for a
quick sell of a falling stock in a falling market, but someone was
willing, perhaps the MM, to buy at $6.00. Most of the shares obviously
went thru Herzog, Heine, Gedold. We can presume they would also handle
the selling. HHG volume indicates the shares did not hit the market in
Nov or Dec. (Taxes?)
Conjecture - Deswell was buying below $10.00 in Nov and Dec. They then
told their broker that they would buy below $10.00 until they filled
out the 500K shares. This would let the MM make a buy/sell market at
the $10.00 level until the October shares were gone. Some that bought
hoping to profit on Deswell gave up and sold back at $10.00. Many that
bought lower expecting a higher return settled for the $10.00. This
added to the shares on the sell side. It has taken until now for the
buying strength to absorb the sell side. From the volume, it indicates
that some of the buying is Fund related.
Just putting it out for thought. The volume at this level with no
price movement has been bothering me.
FWIW,
Ron |
