What happened
Shares of AMC Entertainment (AMC -0.64%) are falling 2.2% as of 11:13 a.m. ET on Monday despite there being no specific news pushing the shares lower.
The move is following a pattern established last summer when internet stock traders pushed the movie theater operator's highly shorted shares to unreasonable heights during a meme stock trading frenzy -- it hit almost $73 a share last June -- only to see their value subsequently collapse.
Image source: Getty Images.
So what
AMC should have gotten a boost from the debut of The Batman movie two weeks ago, which opened to a $128 million weekend and raked in another $66 million this past weekend, according to BoxOfficeMojo.com.
The film is the second-biggest post-pandemic movie behind Spider-Man: No Way Home, and because AT&T's (NYSE: T) WarnerMedia division agreed not to show certain films on its HBO Max streaming service for 45 days after their appearance in theaters, operators like AMC have a window of exclusivity again that should help bolster their finances.
But the Caped Crusader isn't tingling the stock market's Spidey senses in the same way.
Now what
Those internet traders will continue to maintain its hedge funds, dark pools, naked shorting, and other plots against AMC that are holding its stock back, and they will gainsay anyone arguing that the fundamentals of the theater chain's business still don't justify its valuation.
With that said, CEO Adam Aron has some bold plans for reviving his company. He recently outlined six strategies beyond just box office success that he believes can pull AMC back up, and while some seem a bit far-fetched, it's notable that the chief executive is willing to look outside the box and just might surprise the market if even a few of the ideas hit their mark.
