(Bloomberg) -- Golden Heaven Group Holdings Ltd. suffered its worst week on record, scoring a potentially major victory for Nate Anderson’s Hindenburg Research roughly a month after the short-seller took aim at the Chinese amusement park operator.

Shares have plunged 93% this week to an all-time low, its worst five-day stretch ever. The cause of the sudden decline isn’t immediately clear but Thursday’s record 89% plunge contributed to the weekly rout and a wave of volatility halts. The company’s market value has fallen to about $70 million from nearly $1.3 billion at its high.

The low float, or total number of shares available to trade publicly, could be the reason for the sharp move. Of the company’s nearly 52 million shares outstanding, only about 18 million are available for the public to trade.

That makes the stock “real easy to manipulate,” said Matthew Tuttle, chief investment officer and CEO at Tuttle Capital Management. “Retail guys love low floaters, they put it out to their groups and get it pumped up, then they sell and it tanks.” 

Trading volume spiked to more than 35 times the daily average on Thursday and remained elevated on Friday as shares fell 41% to $1.36. The Nanping, China-based company debuted on the Nasdaq in April at $4 per share.   

Big moves are like “catnip” for aggressive traders, said Steve Sosnick at Interactive Brokers. “They can’t resist them. And all too many try to catch falling knives, which this one proved to be,” he added. 

The action comes about a month after short-seller Hindenburg Research said it was betting against the company in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter, citing “little news to justify” the stock’s jump. Shares rallied more than 600% from September through mid-November, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. 

Shares fell 28% after the report, the worst one-day drop at the time, but quickly regained its losses and rallied to a fresh high of $24.31 per share on Nov. 27. Golden Heaven Group released a statement on Nov. 16 calling Hindenburg’s allegations “deceptive.”

“Unfortunately, the Nasdaq exchange is littered with dozens of obvious China-based scams. These companies commonly lure in unsuspecting U.S. retail investors through Telegram, Discord, or WhatsApp chat groups then exit through the kind of ‘rug pull’ decline we are seeing with Golden Heaven,” Anderson, founder of Hindenburg Research, said in an email, adding that he has raised the issue with Nasdaq. 

Golden Heaven Group did not respond to a Bloomberg News request for comment outside of its normal business hours.

Earlier this week, Golden Heaven Group announced strategic initiatives to expand its business, and said it intends to enter into an operating lease framework agreement with an unnamed top-tier Chinese amusement group.

(Updates stock moves at market close.)

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