Author: u/HomeDepotHank69
****Not a financial advisor. Not financial advice****
Greetings, Apes. Today I was contemplating whether to cut my hair into a mohawk or to get a bald fade. Obviously, those are very similar. Today, I decided to listen to Linkin Park’s smash hit, “WAP,” which always gets me going. I was definitely feeling a little high cuz I had just consumed THREE, yes THREE, fig newtons when I got a message from another primate. I was hoping that he was going to tell me about a new flavor of pringles that I could try, but instead, he pointed out something important about the FTD cycle that I might’ve missed. His name is u/precocious_kid if you’re wondering. So, perhaps in my WD40-filled voyage in my shed, I missed this important paragraph in Regulation SHO:
“Rule 204 provides an extended period of time to close out certain failures to deliver. Specifically, if a failure to deliver position results from the sale of a security that a person is deemed to own and that such person intends to deliver as soon as all restrictions on delivery have been removed, the firm has up to 35 calendar days following the trade date to close out the failure to deliver position by purchasing securities of like kind and quantity. Such additional time is warranted and does not undermine the goal of reducing failures to deliver because these are sales of owned securities that cannot be delivered by the settlement date due solely to processing delays outside the seller’s or broker-dealer’s control. Moreover, delivery is required to be made on such sales as soon as all restrictions on delivery have been removed and situations where a person is deemed to own a security are limited to those specified in Rule 200 of Regulation SHO. A common example of a deemed to own security that cannot be delivered by the settlement date is a security subject to the resale restrictions of Rule 144 under the Securities Act of 1933.”
See that? 35 CALENDAR DAYS. Not trading days. 35 calendar days is exactly 5 weeks (5 weeks and 1 day because T+35). 5 weeks has up to 25 trading days (weeks with holidays would be less), which might help explain why the cycle seems to be anywhere from 19-22 trading days (it says “up to 35 calendar days” so this is a maximum so they could cover before then). ALSO, and maybe even more important, notice that it says “these are sales of owned securities that cannot be delivered by settlement date.” How do they get around owning them? Synthetic longs (ITM calls). So, it makes sense why the price spikes every 35 days (you will see that below) because they don’t actually own the shares, they just own calls that make it look like they own the shares. Then, when the 35 days come, they actually have to buy the shares, which causes the spike.
Well, with this information, I had to take a look. So, I immediately started blasting Coldpay and Katy Perry songs, got FOUR fig newtons (I know, dangerous), sat in my race car bed, turned on my limited edition “your favorite Dino” Barney and Friends mega big boy lamp, and got to work.
What I found, dear apes, was pretty sick. The first thing I did was try to connect the original squeeze with T+35, here’s what I got:
Again, this is T+35 calendar days, not trading days. Remember the 35 day period is a maximum, so they can cover before that!
But what about when GME doubled in late February because the CFO was ousted (again, I still don’t buy this as the reason it doubled because that makes zero sense)? Can T+35 explain that?
The answer is yes. Even the volumes add up. Now, you might be thinking that some of the days that correspond to the T+35 are green, so they don’t count for being a day that the stock was shorted; however, though the days are green, there was still short activity as the price fluctuated greatly in these days. Though buyers won on those days, there was still a fair amount of short pressure.
But wait, are there any more?
2 red candles? Hank stop it, you’ve lost your mind. Well, dear ape, that is true. But if you look closely, though it’s a red day, it gapped up from the previous day. Boom, another increase. But are there more?
This one isn’t as exact because I can’t tell if the short happened on 3/22 or the next day; however, about 35 days later, what do we see? Yup. In the words of K-Pop star, DJ Khaled, anotha one:
But Hank, what about earlier dates?
FUCK, WRONG PICTURE, HERE’S WHAT I WAS LOOKING FOR:
But Hank, surely you’re just an idiot cuck who doesn’t deserve his wife’s boyfriend?
Alright apes, so there’s a fair amount of evidence, but what about connecting monthly option expiries to T+35. Well:
The red lines are monthly option expiries. You may have noticed that I already gave some of the T+35 dates above a different day that was slightly before or after the option expiry. The reason I showed both of these is because it’s hard to know exactly when they covered because T+35 is a maximum, so that means it could be either lined up with option expiry or short attack days….. or both.
“BUT HANK, YOU’RE DIGGING TOO DEEP INTO THIS, IT CAN’T POSSIBLY BE TRUE. THIS IS AN ISOLATED INCIDENT WITH A STOCK THAT TRADES IRRATIONALLY.” Oh little ape. I direct you to this post, which shows that TSLA, Sundial, and Draftkings all do the exact same thing (which makes sense because they have also been heavily shorted): https://www.reddit.com/r/GME/comments/n1m2bx/ftd_volume_in_shorted_stocks_have_clear_cycles/
Shoutout to u/floW– you are loved by Hank
I also tested this theory with AMC and it works just as well (didn’t feel like posting screen shots because am lazy). Now, you’re definitely thinking to yourself, “but Hank how can this be true, are you saying it’s a market-wide phenomena?”
YES
I will now direct your attention to an important DD about 2 important OCC rules that I think everyone should be aware of. These could explain why we are trading sideways and could also show where we might be heading. These have to do with FTDs, so it compliments this theory:Â https://www.reddit.com/r/Superstonk/comments/mu9xed/why_were_still_trading_sideways_and_why_we_havent/
Shoutout to u/c-digs for this post, you are also loved by Hank.
Finally, I would direct your attention to every single post by the absolute ZADDY who is u/atobitt. This KING does legitimate research on the problems of naked shorts, rehypothecation, and FTDs on a market-wide basis and shows how it’s a giant house of cards. There was also a QA with Dr. Trimbath (hopefully you already know about that) and she goes over the dangers of naked shorts and FTDs in Wallstreet and how it’s a bigger problem than anyone thinks. Overall, this is just further evidence of the dangers of FTDs and how pervasive they are in the market.
Where to next?
I’d like to keep digging and see if I can find anything else related to T+35 or any smaller trends in FTDs (maybe related to weekly options but IDK if there’s anything there). I’d also like to emphasize the point I made the other day about there being these random green candles in the middle of the day for GME, which are the highest volume of the day and are an anomaly when compared to other stocks (but not AMC). Maybe FTDs can explain this as well? We shall see.
Finally, I want to reemphasize a point that I made in a previous DD to put this into perspective:
“There are many DDs that say similar things to this involving periods revolving around FTD cycles and price increases. Some of these DDs are identical. Others are very similar and others are different. Some say that the FTD period is X days while others say it’s Y days. Some say it’s based on option expiry, others say it’s just random, others say it’s based on ETFs. HOWEVER, all of them have one crucial thing in common, which is the most important thing for you to get from this DD: HFs are TRAPPED in an FTD cycle and are using every trick in the book to reset/delay the FTDs. The only way for them to get out of it is for apes to lose interest and sell the stock. This cycle gets more and more expensive for them as time goes on and eventually the cost will outweigh their resources and they will be forced out through margin calls.”
That’s all for now. Stay strong, apes.
****Not a financial advisor. Not financial advice****