The SPAC boom will hand investors “a pretty expensive lesson” as the race to go public via blank-check vehicles creates “castles in the sky”, the Financial Times reports, quoting leading short seller Jim Chanos.
The hedge fund manager, who remains best-known for predicting the collapse of energy group Enron, accused some who have taken companies public via a SPAC of “playing fast and loose with their projections” in an effort to entice retail investors. Kynikos Associates, the hedge fund founded by the 63-year-old, is betting against a number of SPACs that are “very bad businesses” and whose valuations “have gotten silly”, Chanos said. He declined to name them. Read more.
