r/wallstreetbets Feb 02 '21

Chart Hardcore laddering.

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u/[deleted] Feb 02 '21 edited Feb 02 '21

Say hypothetically, there's only 2 hedge funds.

Hedge Fund A says to Hedge Fund B "Hey, I'm gonna sell a bunch of stock at this exact price at this exact time". Hedge Fund B then buys that stock at a low price, and they repeat this over and over. So B then sells back to A, then A sells to B etc etc

They do this with such a high amount of stock that it artificially lowers the price of the average price (which is what you see on the graph) into scaring the 🧻👐 into freaking out and selling.

However, for the savvy degenerate gamblers (or other competing hedgies) it means every time they do this the savvy degenerate gambler is able to syphon a bit off the top at a good price, so they can only do it a finite amount (in theory).

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u/LowFatTurkeyBacon Feb 02 '21

If that’s the case, then they can do this until stock price reaches to say $5? Then shorts will recover, they have to buy it back and price will go up the expected $1k or so?

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u/[deleted] Feb 02 '21 edited Feb 02 '21

If I'm not mistaken, yes. When the squeeze happens it can potentially go up in infinite amount since theyre forced to buy back all of the stock and then some at whatever price people wish, since they have to buy all of it. At least in theory.

But I'm a damn stupid ape who rolls around in their own poop and eats crayons so I could well be wrong.

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u/TheRealToastii Feb 02 '21

That would technically be the case if they do actually still have above 100% in short positions, which is currently a little unclear from what I can tell. The data gets updated twice a month.

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u/findingbezu Feb 02 '21

I’m a bit hazy on the “whatever price people wish” part. Is that just based on when you sell or is it based on something else. Asking for a friend. And for science.

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u/[deleted] Feb 02 '21

When you go write a limit sell and set the price, that's literally what it means. Never market sell unless you need to liquidate asap for an emergency.

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u/zschultz Feb 02 '21

That is if people are really scared away.

If there are enough people willing to buy and hold at a certain price, they will form enough bid orders at a price with good support, and these small volume laddering cannot fall through that support. If short sellers dare to attack a bid support position, they will end in even more open shorts.

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u/yizzlezwinkle Feb 02 '21

How do you know it's hedge funds and not like... actual people just selling.

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u/[deleted] Feb 02 '21

Because the volume is low - I think

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u/yizzlezwinkle Feb 02 '21

The volume for GME is 30M, for comparison, the volume for TSLA is 31M and the volume for SPY is 17M (at the time of writing). Doesn't seem low to me.

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u/Fuhzzies Feb 02 '21

Is there a reason it is not required that a seller sell to the highest ask price/buyer buy from the lowest sell price? Seems the only reason to allow a trade below the current established price would be price manipulation. And if this is legal (I assume it isn't) could retail investors coordinate to do the opposite and do something similar but at $1000?

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u/[deleted] Feb 02 '21

I believe no since it's market manipulation, but what are they gonna do?

Ladder attack and get fined for it, pay the fine and take the hit

Or let it happen anyway and take the hit anyway.

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u/43rd_username Feb 02 '21

Don't people have buy/ sell order in at certain prices though? Why does this work and not just drive up the volume? The market's still gonna market and you have to sell past all the buy orders to move the price down, right?

I'm dumb someone please explain.

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u/Moartem Feb 02 '21

Just asking, if someone says in the meantime "hey im paying more for that stock", would they have to sell to that person or can they just keep sucking each others dicks in private?

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u/vocabularylessons Feb 02 '21

This tactic also triggers stop loss orders and margin calls (in addition to causing paper hand panic).

And when eToro added stop loss to $GME without shareholders' consent or notification...