ASX pushes Patriot Battery Metals to address short seller claims
The country’s market operator has asked Patriot Battery Metals to respond to claims by an activist short-seller that the lithium explorer has manipulated its stock price and “over-touted” the size of its reserves.
The lithium explorer placed its shares in a trading halt on Monday morning following the ASX request and a report by The Australian Financial Review’s Street Talk columnthat Pilbara Minerals was in talks with Patriot over possible offtake agreements, joint ventures and equity investment.
Ex-Pilbara Minerals boss Ken Brinsden is chairman of Patriot Battery Metals. Trevor Collens
Patriot, which is chaired by ex-Pilbara Minerals boss Ken Brinsden, said it had placed shares in a halt until Wednesday to work through claims made by the activist short seller following a request from ASX, to address the deal speculation and to finalise winter drilling results.
Patriot owns the Corvette lithium project in James Bay, Quebec, and maintains a primary listing on the Toronto Stock Exchange. It listed its securities on the ASX in December.
Night Market Research, the North American short seller, accused the lithium hopeful on Friday of stock price manipulation via periodic buyout rumours, over-estimating the size of its reserves by 40 per cent, and delaying a comprehensive resource update seven times. “With the highly anticipated resource estimate approaching [at the end of July], we think Patriot is near a speculative peak,” the investor wrote in an analysis.
But Mr Brinsden, who built Pilbara Minerals from a penny stock to a $15 billion company, sought to rebuff the short seller’s assault, insisting the project “is really one of the best ones globally”.
Patriot said on Monday it would provide a response to the ASX on the
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