The Corporate Travel Management Ltd (ASX: CTD) share price won't be going anywhere today after the embattled corporate travel specialist requested another trading halt this morning.
Why was the trading halt requested?
According to the release, Corporate Travel Management has requested the granting of an immediate trading halt so that it can review and respond to a further report issued by VGI Partners.
The release explains that the company became aware of a 52-page report from VGI Partners on Monday night, six days following its response to the original report.
Management has stated that it believes "that VGI Partners' further report raises no substantive new issues but it is not possible for CTD to fully review the further report or comprehensively respond by the time the market opens today."
It has requested that its shares remain halted until the earlier of the release of a response to the report or the commencement of trade on Thursday November 8.
What was in the new report?
The report has not been made public so it is unclear what it contains. However, the AFR is reporting that VGI Partners has challenged the company's claim that the hedge fund concealed the extent of its inquiries.
Corporate Travel Management suggested that it had been caught off guard by the allegations, but an email chain allegedly shows this not to be the case.
In addition to this, the AFR report confirms that VGI Partners has not closed its short position. In fact, the short seller has actually increased its "short bet against Corporate Travel Management by 23 per cent to more than 2.5 million shares."
What now?
As I mentioned earlier, I think Corporate Travel Management's shares are trading at a very attractive level given its strong long term growth potential.
However, things like this don't tend to blow over very quickly. Because of this, I'd suggest investors stick with Helloworld Travel Ltd (ASX: HLO) or Webjet Limited (ASX: WEB) until the dust settles.
