AMC CEO Taunts Short Sellers As 'Thor' Leads Hot Weekend Box Office

The CEO of one of the largest movie theater chains is no stranger to sharing positive comments on his company. Here’s what AMC Entertainment Holdings AMC CEO Adam Aron had to say about the company’s recent strong weekend and a potential call out to short sellers.

What Happened: The weekend of July 7 through July 10 was AMC’s most attended weekend in 2022 for its U.S. movie theaters, the company reported. Global theaters had more than 5.9 million attendees worldwide.

Admissions revenue for the four day period was up 12% to the comparative time period from 2019. The box office was led by the Walt Disney Co. DIS release “Thor: Love and Thunder” and also saw contributions from “Minions: The Rise of Gru,” “Top Gun: Maverick,” “Jurassic World Dominion,” “Elvis” and “The Black Phone” according to the release.

The company also said admissions revenue in the U.S. was up 14% compared to the same time period in 2019. Admissions revenue for the weekend was around double the same weekend in 2021.

“We are just thrilled beyond thrilled that this weekend approximately more than 5.9 million people were guests at AMC movie theaters in the United States and internationally, making it our highest attended and highest grossing weekend of 2022 so far,” Aron said.

Aron took to Twitter Monday to share the update on AMC’s weekend and also might have offered a comment to short sellers.

“To industry doubters who predict extinction of theaters: #CHOKEonTHAT,” Aron tweeted.

Related Link: What's Going On With AMC Entertainment Stock 

Why It’s Important: Aron has tweeted several times using the hashtag “chokeonthat,” which may refer to short sellers of AMC, which has been a popular stock for short sellers.

According to data from Benzinga Pro, 21.9% of AMC’s float is currently short.

Aron previously tweeted with the hashtag in reference to “Top Gun: Maverick” passing the one billion dollar box office gross milestone.

“Other than a few idiots that readily come to my mind, and likely yours, who in the **** can still say movie theaters are dead and have no future?” Aron tweeted.

Last week, Aron issued a tweet that suggested “Wen pounce” in reference to a potential short squeeze. Aron said a potential pounce might not happen before second quarter earnings are announced.

“Press release issued today that Q2 earnings to be announced on Thurs, August 4. Read between those lines,” Aron tweeted.

AMC will report second quarter financial results after market close on Aug. 4, which could highlight the strong box office performance in the month of June, along with a preview of how the current third quarter is performing on a comparative basis.

Aron has highlighted a strong lineup of movies for the summer and continuing up to Christmas.

Benzinga recently highlighted that six months into 2022, five movies passed the $200 million domestic total, compared to only three movies passing the milestone in all of 2021. Through the first six months of 2022, the domestic box office is up over 263% from the prior year.

Experts see the domestic box office hitting between $7.5 billion and $8 billion for 2022, suggesting the second half will come in a range of $3.9 billion to $4.4 billion and ahead of the first half of the year.

AMC Price Action: AMC shares are up 2% to $14.91 on Monday.