May 24, 2025

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Genius Brands CEO Says Short Reports Full Of ‘Misleading Statements’

Genius Models Worldwide, a children’s media enterprise, said Monday that recent short reports are total of “misleading statements, omissions of essential info, and crimson herrings.”

The stock trades around $5.twenty for every share, soon after soaring from 73 cents on May perhaps 12 to as significant as $7.93 on June three.

Genius’ response was penned by CEO and Chairman Andy Heyward. He wrote that as a person of the major traders in the enterprise, his “interests are completely aligned with those people of my fellow shareholders — and will continue being so.” Around the past two many years, the CEO stated he has been escalating his private stake in the enterprise and has “not sold a single share.”

Getting stated that, Heyward’s assertion is meant to “clarify specific info as it relates to the short seller details that has been place into the marketplace.”

[Editor’s Observe: Short-seller Hindenburg Exploration on June 5 stated the recent runup in Genius Manufacturer shares would be short-lived, proclaiming the stock would fall to $1.fifty inside of a thirty day period. Hindenburg stated portion of  the explanation is providing force from 131 million shares and share equivalents issued from recent financing rounds that will grow to be readily available to trade inside of an believed two to 4 weeks.]

Making Price. Genius is “well-positioned” to build value for traders, Heyward wrote. The Kartoon Channel! is scheduled to start on June 15 and will be readily available to a lot more than a hundred million U.S. Television homes and two hundred million cellular equipment. This would place the enterprise as “one of the preeminent” advert-supported kids’ digital networks.

Harmony Sheet Update. The enterprise has plenty of dollars on its harmony sheet to fulfill its existing obligations and work on its business for at minimum sixty months, such as funding new creation and content material acquisitions, according to the CEO.

Pointing Out “Industry Ignorance.” The short-seller report’s criticism of Genius’ programs “highlight their individual industry ignorance.” As an example, the short seller report pointed out “Rainbow Rangers” being scaled again on Nick Jr.

Even so, Heyward stated this is “standard industry practice” and will ramp again in August with new content along with a planned start of toys from Mattel.

Management Staff Strength. The management team is composed of industry veterans responsible for “many of the most significant and most profitable hits in children’s tv background.”

“Collectively, we have a lot more than one hundred fifty many years of expertise in children’s media, and have helped make actually tens of billions of pounds of content material and consumer merchandise gross sales,” the CEO wrote in the release.

Long-Phrase Story. Finally, Genius Models signifies a prolonged-phrase development tale with a lot more than 450 accredited merchandise contracted with developments and guarantees that will enter the sector in “the coming months.” The enterprise will also introduce 350 other accredited consumer merchandise SKUs across other classes, like apparel, publishing, touring reveals, amid some others.

“After functioning with Warren Buffett for twenty five many years and developing the children’s animated series with Warren to train fiscal literacy (“Warren Buffett’s Top secret Millionaires Club”), I have figured out to emphasis on the importance of the basics: asset development and value-developing for our shareholders,” Heyward wrote.

This story originally appeared on Benzinga.

© 2020 Benzinga.com. Benzinga does not present financial commitment suggestions. All legal rights reserved.

Graphic: Nick Jr.
Benzinga, Genius Models, Mattel, Rainbow Rangers, short seller