MC Inside Edge: White Knight doubles down on Vodafone, Desi Soros gets MOIL timing right, Kolkata HNIs play Hind Motor ambassadors

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Give me more

The tug of war in the Vodafone stock continues. There was a lot of chatter about the pre-open session on Thursday, with many traders not getting the shares they had bid for despite having bid higher than the discovered price of Rs 11.80. Allegations abound about some large players having managed to get ‘lucky’ by being able to buy right at the bottom and then dump the shares quickly when the market opened for trading. Also the manner in which the stock briefly tipped the upper circuit filter on one exchange and not the other is also a subject of chatter.

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Meanwhile, on Friday, a block of 3 percent of the company’s equity changed hands early on in the session. Though the deal happened at a 4-5% discount to market price, the stock is trading higher. Talk is that the White Knight fund, which had bailed out a high-profile corporate house last year, is the buyer of the block. White Knight was among big buyers in the anchor book as well, Vodafone watchers feel the fund could be doubling down on its bet.

Brand ambassadors

Push up prices enough and retail will come rushing in, never mind the fact that the company has zero revenues. Knowing this, a cartel of Kolkata-based HNIs are stirring up action in the Hindustan Motors stock. And they are getting plenty of support from high frequency trading (HFT) firms as well. The company ceased production long back, but chatter about sale of land and a hefty dividend to shareholders surface during every bull run. And this time, bulls have added a dash of electric vehicle (EV) as well to the narrative. Since volumes and prices have spiked, the stock has drawn the attention of retail investors as well. But they need to be aware that this is purely a flavour of the season stock: if you fail to exit in time, the next opportunity will be in the next bull market.

MOIL on boil

Shares of manganese miner MOIL have been on a tear over the past few sessions. The fundamental story is that global manganese ore supply is expected to get tighter following a longer-than-expected supply disruption from major supplier South32. Earlier this week, South32 said it would take till March 2025 to restart manganese ore exports from Australia after a tropical cyclone last month damaged infrastructure there. Desi Soros had accumulated the stock during the December quarter. Chatter is that he has been adding to the position over the last couple of days. But it is hard to say when Desi Soros is playing the long term game and when he is playing the short term game.