Until ten big hedge funds They crowd at the doors of Solaria waiting for it to fall on the stock market. These bearish investors have managed to gather close to 10% of the capital of the Spanish company, according to CNMV records, a record since several funds surrounded the Dia supermarket chain in 2017, while the Russian capital holding Letterone of Mikhail Fridman took control of the group.
Funds from world-class firms such as Citadel (-0,67%), Blackrock (-3,48%), JPMorgan AM (-1,08%) o Franklin Templeton (-0.61%), along with other lesser-known specialists in short positions such as PDT Partners (-0,5%), Cubist (-0,52%), Qube (-0,69%), Marble (-0,94%), I belong (-0,7%) y Walleye (-0.51%) have made Solaria the number one target company for these investors.
All of them exceed the 0.5% cut-off that the CNMV sets to force them to notify their position in the Spanish company dedicated to solar energy. To the ten investment franchises mentioned, we should also add the hedge funds of Millenium y AHL Partnersalthough their participation has fallen below that level this week and, theoretically, their presence no longer counts even if they are still short.
The agglomeration of bearish investors on Solaria This comes as the company faces a difficult sectoral context due to the pressure from Chinese competitors and the start of a tariff war in the United States that has raised barriers for Asian companies in that country, with a surcharge of 25% to 50% for their solar panels, a penalty aimed at favouring companies ‘made in the USA’.
The company controlled by the Díaz Tejeiro familywith 34.9% of Solaria through the company DTL Corporationhas consolidated itself in 2024 as the worst value of the Ibex 35 with an accumulated decline of close to 40%, thus surpassing the pharmaceutical company Grifols, suffering from a crisis of confidence among investors after the accounting shadows in its accounts and corporate governance that Gotham pointed out.
In the case of Solaria, the instinct of short-sellers has not yet found the weak point of the photovoltaic company that will lead to its fall on the stock market, but the growing presence of hedge funds is arousing suspicion in the market. Three of the largest institutional shareholders of the Spanish company are also helping short-sellers through securities lending.
The most flagrant case is that of BlackRockwhich declares a 3.85% stake in Solaria and, of that percentage, 0.95% of the capital is lent to other investors. At the same time, one of the hedge funds of the same manager is positioned to the downside with the aforementioned -3.48%. Seen from another perspective, the aggregate position of the ETF giant gains more from the fall than from the rise in the photovoltaic stock market, not only because of the shorts, but also because of the ‘rent’ it charges for the shares sold.
Similarly, the British manager Invesco has lent 1.04% of the 3% that it declares in Solaria. It is another of the prominent suppliers of shares to short-term investors. Likewise, Bank of Norwaycustodian of the shares of the sovereign wealth fund Norwaydeclares to the CNMV that it controls 3.96% of the solar company, although up to 3.17% (80% of the total participation) is constituted as a loan. Between the three institutional investors, they keep a little more than 5% of Solaria’s capital blocked as a loan for the short-sellers, a temporary circumstance because they will return the shares to their legitimate owners when they finish using them and, to do so, they have to buy them back on the market.
Source: www.lainformacion.com
