Matthew 'Dark Destroyer' Earl of hedge fund Shadowfall amassed a large short position in Darktrace late last year on a bearish bet on its churn rate, leadership team and corporate culture. Earlier that year, Darktrace faced an attack from another short seller called Quintessential Capital Management. Quintessential's accusations of accounting shortfalls within Darktrace led to Big Four accountant EY launching an investigation into its financial reports. The investigation came up empty, but the whole ordeal undoubtedly added unquantifiable negative sentiment around the group.