Weekly Wrap Up: Sunday, September 6, 2026

Three investigations landed this week against a market that barely moved. The Dow slipped 0.2%, the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq 100 each edged higher, and the names under scrutiny went the other way, falling 7.0% on average. One of them, a cannabis grower turned crypto treasury, was down more than 20% before its first week had even closed.

The Market and the Shorts

Dow (DIA), S&P 500 (SPY), Nasdaq 100 (QQQ), from the August 28 close to the September 4 close. The names shorted this week fell 7.0% on average by Friday's close, each measured from its close the day before the report, and a decline there is a gain for the short side, which is why it is the one number in green. Across all open Activ8 shorts, now 204 names, 56.9% fell and the median move was -0.8%.

The Tape

Why it matters. None of this week's three reports has a closed first week, so none can be ranked against the 1,370 on record. What can be said is that ZeroStack is four days old and already down 20.5%, against an all-report median first week of -4.6% and against Fugazi Research's own median of -23.5% across 25 scored reports. Karman is two days old at -2.7%, close to The Equity Dispatch's -2.2% median. Achieve is a single session old and higher. The wider book was quiet: across 204 open short targets the median name moved -0.8% and only 56.9% fell. Three investigators, three sectors, and nobody converged.

Funded, not earned

Three reports, three sectors, one shared question: where is the cash actually coming from? The Equity Dispatch argues Karman's guided EBITDA of $218.8 million overstates cash generation at a company that has never produced positive operating cash flow. shortfinder points to Achieve filing a $150 million at-the-market program while already sitting on $187.3 million. Fugazi Research describes a share count that ran from 2.4 million to over 21.8 million in months. None of the three turns on the product. All three turn on the financing, as did August's monthly report, where one campaign carried the entire average.

Activ8 News Desk

August 2026 Monthly Short Selling Report

Sixteen activist short reports landed in August and nine left their target trading lower, but the headline average of -4.1% describes almost none of them. The median campaign moved its target -1.5%. Strip out Fugazi Research's case against T3 Defense, which finished 71.8% below the price it opened at, and the other fifteen averaged +0.4%. The report is also honest about its own timing problem: five of the sixteen published in the month's final week and had a week or less to play out.

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Behind the Bear Ragnarok Research

Ragnarok Research published its first short thesis at fifteen, with no terminal, no expert network and nobody above it to sign off on the work. What it had was the Wayback Machine, and archived pages showing Innodata repointing its stated strategy at whatever trend had just arrived, in versions the live site no longer carried. The report landed in September 2023. The stock fell 20.9% inside a week and was down 38.5% three months later. Six campaigns on, the founder is eighteen.

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The Campaigns

ZeroStack Corp is the company formerly known as Flora Growth, a Nasdaq-listed cannabis grower that redomiciled and rebranded in January 2026 around a treasury of 0G tokens and a decentralised-AI strategy. Fugazi Research alleges the new narrative rests on the same record as the old one: unverifiable public claims, insider self-dealing and serial dilution.

Key Points

• Total assets fell 80.7% in two quarters, from $130.2 million at December 31, 2025 to $25.2 million at June 30, 2026, with shareholders' equity down 80.4% over the same period, according to the report's reading of ZeroStack's own filings.
• The 0G token treasury was carried at $15.2 million against a $163.4 million cost basis, a decline of roughly 91%, and Fugazi Research notes management's liquidity assessment moved from sufficient for twelve months to substantial doubt inside a single quarter.
• Texas Blocker, the private vehicle formed to receive the token contribution, was created and controlled by ZeroStack's own CEO and CFO, who the report alleges sat on both sides of a transaction their employer later acquired.

In context. Fugazi Research's report #18 of 2026 and #26 since 2025, against a median first week of -23.5% across 25 scored reports. This one is 4 day(s) old, so it has no first week to score yet. Financial Services has drawn 21 of the year's 171 reports, from 15 different investigators.

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Karman Holdings is a defense roll-up that has grown revenue by acquiring contractors and subcontractors, funded largely with debt. The Equity Dispatch argues the market is paying roughly 70 times forward earnings for growth that has never converted into positive operating cash flow.

Key Points

• Per the public preview of the report, guided adjusted EBITDA of $218.8 million for 2026 implies about 28 times EV/EBITDA, roughly a 70% premium to the S&P 500 and a 50% premium to the aerospace and defense sector.
• The Equity Dispatch argues EBITDA is a poor cash-flow proxy here because it carries a negative drag from a rapid build-up in contract assets, and that stripping that out leaves a materially lower figure.
• Acquisitions are repeatedly disclosed as "not material" despite significant sums paid, which the report ties to internal control weaknesses it describes as concerning given the accounting demands of defense work.

The full report is available to The Equity Dispatch subscribers (subscribe here).

In context. The Equity Dispatch's report #17 of 2026 and #42 since 2023, against a median first week of -2.2% across 41 scored reports. This one is 2 day(s) old, so it has no first week to score yet. Industrials has produced 31 of the year's 171 reports from 20 investigators, second only to Technology.

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Achieve Life Sciences is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company whose valuation rests on FDA approval of its lead candidate. shortfinder, a quantitative platform rather than a traditional activist short seller, flags the shares at a twelve-month high on a drug that has not been approved, with substantial dilution already scheduled.

Key Points

• The share count is projected to rise 68% before the FDA decision resolves, which shortfinder argues would erode per-share value even if approval arrives.
• A $150 million at-the-market program was filed roughly three weeks before the report, despite $187.3 million of cash already on the balance sheet.
• shortfinder frames approval as the exit event rather than a re-rating, arguing it is the point at which the capital-raising story completes.

In context. Shortfinder's report #23 of 2026 and #46 since 2022, against a median first week of -1.0% across 44 scored reports. This one is 0 day(s) old, so it has no first week to score yet. Healthcare accounts for 28 of the year's 171 reports but from only 12 investigators, the most concentrated of this week's three sectors.

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Campaign Updates

• Viceroy Research published a follow-up on Blue Moon Metals. According to the report, Blue Moon told the market in June that Nussir's permitting framework was complete, and 26 days later the subsidiary applied for a landfill permit its own filing says existing approvals do not specifically cover; a second note on 4 September alleges the chief executive described a roughly $30m Department of Defense grant as approved to selected analysts, and says Viceroy has written to the OSC and the DoD.

The Borrow

Short selling, explained. One mechanic a week.

What happens if the lender wants the shares back?

Shorting a stock means borrowing it, and the loan carries terms most people never read. The lender can recall the shares at any time, and the rate accrues daily.

Settlement is where those terms get tested. US equities settle T+2: two business days after a short sale executes, the shares must reach the buyer. If the broker cannot deliver, a fail to deliver is recorded, and for most securities it must be closed out by the morning of T+4, at whatever the market offers.

A buy-in is that forced close. It can come from a lender recall, a settlement failure, or the broker's own risk decision, and the short seller controls neither the timing nor the price.

ZeroStack shows why float size matters. It carried roughly 2.4 million shares at the end of June, after a cumulative 780-to-1 reverse split, and over 21.8 million by late August. A stock joins the threshold securities list when fails exceed 10,000 shares for five straight settlement days and reach 0.5% of shares outstanding. On the June count that second test was about 12,000 shares. On the August count it is nearer 109,000.

Two routes in: borrow the common and sell it, or buy puts and let someone else carry the borrow. Fugazi Research does not disclose which, if either, it used.

Around the Short World

India's regulator chases the Adani short trade offshore - SEBI is holding hearings over trades it says benefited from advance knowledge of Hindenburg's 2023 report, and is trying to ring-fence assets in a Mauritius fund insolvency. Source: Finimize

The Bear Cave finds five education stocks in AI's path - With artificial intelligence unsettling the graduate job market, The Bear Cave names five public companies whose business depends on students still believing a degree pays for itself. Source: The Bear Cave

Lead-laced soil piles up beside Honolulu's rail line - Hunterbrook's own testing suggests dust from a contractor's stockpiles of contaminated soil may be drifting into some of Honolulu's poorest and densest neighbourhoods. Source: Hunterbrook Media