Avis erases what’s left of its 390% April gain on news that major holder dumped 4.3 million shares

Oftentimes when you rent a car, you take it right back where you got it from.

Same thing for shares of Avis, apparently:

The rental car company’s stock is down about 20% this morning amid a mixed set of quarterly results thanks to the revelation that one of its biggest shareholders, Pentwater Capital Management, sold over 4.3 million shares on April 22 at very wide range of prices (from about $250 to $700).

That session, Avis traded up nearly 19% in the premarket (breaching $800) but closed down a whopping 37.8%. At its premarket lows, the stock had erased its entire monthly gain, which was 390% as of the close on April 21.

Somewhat inexplicably, not only did Avis fail to exhaust the 5 million-share at-the-market offering it launched in late March at the onset of this parabolic move, but it didn’t even sell a share!

“It is important to note that Avis has not bought or sold a share since 2024,” CEO Brian Choi said during the earnings call on Wednesday.

“We were in a quiet period,” he added, when asked about why the company didn’t take advantage of its lofty share price. “But I can tell you this much: we have no intention of issuing shares anywhere near these levels.”

The footnotes of Pentwater’s filings note that some of its sales run afoul of the mandate that insiders and over 10% holders can’t make money on trades within a six-month period, and that it has “agreed to voluntarily disgorge to the Issuer any short-swing profits realized from these matchable transactions in accordance with Section 16(b) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934.”