Comment by ahupp
4 years ago
> Initial Disclosure: After extensive research, we have taken a short position in shares of Nikola Corp.
This is a great example of why shorts are socially valuable. Without that incentive who would go to the trouble of doing all this research to uncover (possible) fraud? This topic that comes up a lot on Money Stuff, where its easier for private companies to hide misbehavior because you can only short the public ones.
Short sellers, especially public ones, have a critical role in our equity markets. They remind me of defense attorneys. It's a sometimes thankless job and nobody likes you for being too good at it, but it is absolutely vital to keep the system healthy. Kudos to these guys for doing the fucking work.
I liked the bit where someone rented a car out in the middle of the desert and rolled it down a low grade hill for several miles to prove the truck demo was unpowered.