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Anonymous Hackers Turned Stock Analysts Are Targeting US, Chinese Corporations (softpedia.com)
An anonymous reader writes: A smaller group of Anonymous, called Anonymous Analytics, reached the conclusion that DDoSing is stupid and never fixes anything, so they decided to use their hacking skills and stock market knowledge to make a difference in another way. For the past years, the group has been compiling market reports on U.S. and Chinese companies and publishing their results. Their reports have been noticed by the stock market, who recently started to react to their findings. The most obvious case was of Chinese lottery machine maker REXLot. The hackers discovered that REXLot inflated its revenue and the amount of cash on its balance sheet, based on the amount of interest earned. "The group published its findings on June 24, 2015, and REXLot stock price plummeted from 0.485 Hong Kong dollar per share to 0.12, before trading was suspended [for ten months]. REXLot rejoined the market on April 18, 2016, this year, but even after submitting a 53-page report, the company stock fell again by 50 percent," reports Softpedia. Anonymous Analytics then published two more reports on the company, urging the market to sell, and two days later, Reuters reported that REXLot did not have enough cash to make due bond payments, which meant the company had to sell assets to repay bonds. Other companies on which the group published market reports include Qihoo 360 and Western Union.
and following the money.
with perfect knowledge so the free market capitalists should be happy !
CPA and former auditor here. I'd be shocked if a publicly traded company was actually able to materially misstate cash. It's one of the easiest balance sheet items to audit, and publicly traded companies are required to be audited. You literally pull the bank statements as of the end of the year. The cash is either there or it isn't. There are a few reconciling items such as deposits in transit or checks that haven't cleared, but it's typically not a lot. I haven't read Anonymous' report, but it doesn't pass the smell test.
I guess you haven't have any exposure to 3rd world stock markets
I have the pleasure of constantly receiving IPO proposals from 3rd world companies, in which, the statements printed on the IPO proposals don't even add up!
And yet, every single of those 'don't add up' IPO got their 'go ahead' and they are now listed in various 3rd world country stock exchanges
Suffice to say their performance sux, and their accounting sux even more
Except for Demand Media.
I wonder if the people who run this have money in Demand Media?
Yeah but the IT budget will still be the first thing cut when it's time to save money
Anonymous Analytics is doing the one thing that stock analysis don't do!
it's about time that bad security finally start hurting companies in a real way.
This is not hurting companies. It is hurting crooked managers. The company belongs to the shareholders, and transparency helps shareholders. Sure, the stock price went down, but the stock price would have fallen even more if the reckoning had been delayed.
They might have used insider knowledge or just some good guessing on their analysis (their Western Union one makes sense to me). But, my best guess based on quick research into online companies is that I traced the probable owners of this site to a Malaysian company called "Virtus Offshore Investment Company". They ran some HYIPs a few years ago.
It also seems to be tied to Webhosting companies Shinjiru.com and Advanced Hosting Technology both of Malaysia.
I got a Venn diagram of this that looks like a damn spirograph doodle, but this is it in a nutshell.
Remember, I am some guy on the internet. Don't get the torches and pitchforks out or anything.
analysts do.
I really doubt this is a "branch" of anonymous.
The yakuza have been employing similar tactics for decades. They wouldnt like people muscling on their turf.
It is a great way to make money. Find out something about a company, sort the stock, and the broadcast. Or just make something up.
This is the one area that that supports whistle blowers. If the NSA was a company, Snowden could be rich.
I'm"one guy who recognizes that free trading markets will always occur, underground or in the light of day. I'm glad to see this, assuming the reports are true and don't misrepresent the facts. (It's possible for something to be technically true, yet thoroughly misleading.)
I'm also a career information security professional (hacker) and it's good to see people who relate to Anonymous doing something above-board and apparently quite productive, rather than causing damage.
A belief that free markets work better than having Washington bureacrats make decisions for you does typically recognize that you are best equipped to make decisions about your own life when you have the relevant information. This information appears to be relevant to investors, so it's a good thing. (Again assuming it is true and not misleading).
> It is hurting crooked managers.
Who often have golden parachutes already set up.
Hello markov chain!
But managers make the decision to hire security, not shareholders.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Anonymous is finally hitting corporations where it hurts: in the wallet.
I guess you didn't read that story on Slashdot from a few years ago about an HP acquisition. One of the successors as CEO to Carly Fiorina insisted that HP buy out some smaller company that had some niche product they wanted to sell. HP rushed through their due diligence process as the CEO insisted that the buyout happen immediately. A little before they got bought out, some dude, some average joe guy who was an investor, took a look at the company's reports and wrote an article saying how there was simply no way that they could possibly be making the revenue they were reporting and it was very likely fraud. Nobody paid any attention This had to be a publicly traded company because this guy got access to more numbers than you'd get for a privately held company. Then after the acquisition it quickly went south because HP realized that nothing the company claimed in terms of sales was accurate and some stock market writer found a copy of the average joe's article questioning the company's finances and it went viral. There are a lot of companies out there and yes, nobody can probably go over each and every one of them, especially the smaller ones, with a fine tooth comb.
I remember when it was all for the LULZ
This will only end in tears and sadness.
And fire if we're lucky.
Years ago, I developed a system to analyze stock option prices in real time for the purpose of automated trading. The algorithm was designed to detect overbought and oversold options, and trade ahead of the inevitable market correction.
Although the system worked, it occasionally lost scary amounts of (simulated) money. It seems that some people traded high volumes against the market, buying into options that were already overbought, selling even when the option was oversold. It seemed as if these traders knew something that everyone else didn't. Sure enough, the company would report something surprising, and the market would move in favor of the people who traded ahead of the news.
Ultimately, I abandoned the notition of automated options trading, but not before discovering how well the system could detect insider trading. The options market is subject to all sorts of shenanigans, but it's a pretty good advance indicator of the underlying stock. The more insider trading a company has, the better the algorithm works.
If these Anonymous people are conducting research and detecting public reporting anomalies, the path of maximum profit is to short sell the stock, knowing that the price will fall when the truth finally emerges. Using this method, you instruct your broker to " short sell" 1000 shares of XYZ Corp. The broker "borrows" the shares from someone else's account and sells them. You get the cash and the obligation to return the shares (cover the position) at a some future time. If all goes well, you can keep the position open as long as you like, wait for the stock to fall, and then cover (buy back and return) the borrowed shares at a lower price.
Looks like the hackers found a few cash cows. Good for them!
"Anonymous Members Arrested By SEC For Insider Trading In Advance Of Negative Reports"