This forum has no shortage of conspiracy theories floating around, and some of them are probably right on the money, but indulge me to present one possible scenario to explain how ECU has been behaving lately...

The ECU.wt issue is free trading, and relatively low volume. Assuming one could accumulate a large position patiently, by sitting on bids during the usual volatility and building through small buys, it is possible that one trader has acquired half a million wrts. Given that ECU is a volatile stock and silver is also frequently subject to violent swings, it is then pretty easy for a trader with balls to play the dips.

Wait until the COT report for silver shows a huge buildup of shorts and the stock is trading in the higher end of its range. Then when the trap is sprung, short hundreds of thousands of shares at a time to collapse the market price and panic the retail suckers that seem to panic at the first sign of a correction. The common stock plunges 10 cents or more in a few dyas of trading. Then sit on the bid with a huge block on the offer and let any selling presure come to you so you can cover your short position, within a couple of days of putting it on.

My guess is that at least one trader is working that scam, which I might add is perfectly legal, and making tens of thousands of dollars on the trade. And its pretty much risk free since if the market runs away from his short, he can just exercise the wrts at a profit, and then deliver the shares to cover the short. Since the entire scheme could be run in just a few days, it is unlikely that it would show up in the net short reporting window.

Once the dust settles and ECU moves higher again, he can pull the same scam again. And again... I hope I am wrong on this one, but if I am even close to being right, we have to put up with this for a long time because the wrts have several years before they expire.

cheers!

mike