On 31 March Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan, while addressing the media outside of the Treasury offices in Pretoria after he and his deputy Mcebisi Jonas had been fired via SMS the night before, called on South Africans to mobilise and organise against corruption and State Capture. In Cape Town, seasoned equities trader and hedge fund manager James Gubb heeded the call. As a form of protest, Gubb began trading Gupta-owned Oakbay shares in order to create, in the price chart, a work of art depicting a middle finger. By MARIANNE THAMM.
Three days after James Gubb created what must rank as the first piece of protest art on a financial media platform in the world – trading between two accounts, illiquid Oakbay Resources and Energy shares in order to create the image of an “up yours” middle finger in the price chart – some market analysts speculated that the surge might have been due to a “renewed optimism about the nuclear programme”.
IOL’s Business Report – owned by Iqbal Surve – speculated that Oakbay’s “fortunes” were linked to a rising demand for uranium and that this might have caused a spike in the share price. Another analyst suggested the surge could have been related to “changes at National Treasury”. Read more