As someone who is sitting on a nice haul of HIVE Blockchain (HIVE.V) shares, the action of late last week had me a bit concerned.
Word is that, with a short sell getting absolutely crushed on the market, the powers that be nudged HIVE into a direction that would bring the rocketing stock under a bit more control, by releasing stock early, and allowing a bit more liquidity in the market.
Whether that came at the behest of regulators or the company’s execs simply realized an upward movement that hard and fast was unhealthy for the stock, the adjustment brought the stock down fairly hard int he expectation we’d see a sell-off today, when those shares came free trading.
Well they’re free trading, and if there’s any heavy selling on HIVE right now, it must be getting matched by heavy buying because, at the time of writing, the stock is up 3.3%.
We received a comment in a previous article about HIVE that questioned the theory that HIVE wasn’t just helping early investors cash in.
I agree with Tom. I don’t think the short selling protection spin makes sense. I fired off an email to Frank Holmes at HIVE Blockchain Tech asking him why the leadership of the company would interfere in the trading of the stock by allowing the Lockup to end earlier. They must have a reason for doing what they did. They wouldn’t do this for the sh**ts and giggles, there has got to be another reason. The way I see it there’s three possibilities as to why HIVE would do this. 1. Regulators may have been making waves for HIVE, which either forced them or scared them into moving the lockup date, in an attempt to remove more scrutiny from the security watchdogs and to slow the share price down. 2. HIVE leadership itself was concerned with the stock moving to quickly, making long term investors uneasy with the share price, so they did this to drive the day traders out, which is what was driving up the share price. 3. The leadership caved to the early investors, who’s shares were in the lockup, causing them to miss out on the current price and massive profits. In my eyes the HIVE leadership’s integrity is now suspect. Can I really trust them to look after my interests, as a retail share holder, when it appears that they are willing to put the interest of everyone else first? They basically threw the long term retail investor under the bus, while someone else, be it early investors, regulators or leadership, gained some sort of advantage from the earlier lockup release date.
Let’s be clear: Today’s trading puts option three off the table. Just because stock is available to trade doesn’t mean the people who own it want to sell.
I’m an example of that. I could cash out my wins on HIVE today and pay a load of taxes and the kids will have a nice Christmas, but I don’t see the action stopping on HIVE any time soon – and any selling for profit will be less likely as we get closer to the end of the year and taxman time.
Blockchain is going nuts as a sector, crypto currencies continue to move hard in the right direction, forks and code weirdness not withstanding, and just because the company has shaken the daytraders like a shaggy dog shaking fleas, doesn’t mean the fleas won’t be back.
HIVE isn’t the only crypto-play. Indeed, Global Blockchain (BLOC.C) changed course yesterday and announced it was going to go all HIVE II, though the market basically ignored the announcement because they’re building a facility rather than buying one, which will see any benefit happening well down the road.
DMG Blockchain’s deal with AIM Explorations to RTO into that vehicle have gone definitive as of yesterday, so that’ll bring another player to the game, this one renting crypto-miner packages to those who can’t host them locally.
And companies like interactive developer Ydreams (YD.V), software platformer Calyx Bio-Ventures (CYX.V), online money lender MOGO (MOGO.T), and POS developer Glance Pay (GET.C) have all announced they’re going to be adding blockchain development to their mix, which brings them near crypto and definitely draws from the same crowd of enthusiasts.
Today, with stories about Ethereum having problems swirling around the press, could have been a big bust for HIVE long holders. If the insiders who got in early and cheap took their cash out opportunity today, it would have put the scarlet letter on the company as one that is all talk.
But that’s not what happened. The founders stuck in. The early financiers kept their cards. This is a BIG sign for the company, and for the industry, that nobody is looking for exits just yet.
If one looks at the chart for Leonovus (LTV.V), you see a really good example of where the investors have gone with tech investments over the last few months. It’s been a hard and fast run, but the last week has seen things cool off a bit, and that’s in no uncertain terms been driven by the handbrake turn of HIVE.
LTV is up 600% from it’s mid September price, but was up higher still last week before the great dust settling. These companies needed that pause. They needed to brace, set a new base, and begin the next climb. HIVE needed it, LTV needed it, even little Calyx needed it.
Now is where the hard work happens. Now is where the real money is made.
— Chris Parry
FULL DISCLOSURE: Calyx, Leonovus and DMG are Equity.Guru marketing clients. The author holds stock in HIVE, Calyx, and Leonovus.
NB: Pursuant to a resolution passed by the directors dated Nov. 27, 2017, Calyx Bio-Ventures Inc. changed its name to Calyx Ventures Inc. effective as at Feb. 5, 2018. The ticker symbol CYX is unchanged.
Hi Chris,
I remember reading that the next block of pre-IPO investors was unlocking in December, but I can’t find any info. Can you confirm when the next wave of cheap shares will unlock?
Yep, there’s a batch unlocking December 10 as I understand it. I’m told some of that has already been traded on the grey market with the December unlock date as the date of trade, so some ten million are already crossed out. Of the rest, I’d expect some profit taking, but not an absurd amount.
There’s another load out in February, but I’m told the vast majority of those are owned by Chairman Frank Holmes, and he’s not likely to sell anything.