Cineworld is facing the opposite of a Hollywood happy ending

The world’s second-biggest cinema chain has confirmed weekend reports that it is contemplating US bankruptcy, writes James Moore

Film fans have not returned to cinemas in the numbers that Cineworld had expected (P)

Remember the GameStop share price surge?

Cineworld was one of the stocks that enjoyed a brief moment in the sun after a Reddit-based gang of small traders, which had poured into the aforementioned retailer, turned its attentions to a tranche of other unloved stocks.

They’d all been in the crosshairs of short sellers on Wall Street and in the City, and the movement led to some rich fingers getting badly burned when positions were unwound. There was a ready supply of schadenfreude around when that happened, too.