A last stab by former shareholders in George Economou’s DryShips to press securities-fraud charges against the Greek shipowner and Kalani Investments has the look of other complaints that have gone nowhere thus far.

The 71-page brief filed in a New York federal court has been called a “third bite at the apple” for the plaintiffs against both DryShips and the former Diana Containerships.

“Long shot” would be another term, as both the allegations and defences are similar to a separate lawsuit already dismissed against Top Ships, a third Greek owner with Kalani dealings.

If there is a lesson from that case, it is that massive destruction of share value combined with a series of reverse stock splits, all well disclosed to the public through filings, does not add up to securities fraud.

US District Judge Gary R Brown has given the DryShips shareholders one final gasp at making a case, rather than dismissing the lawsuit as defence attorneys had urged.

A reply to the new complaint is not yet publicly available.

But the case of DryShips once again brings forth numbers which underline the securities fraud is not the only issue at hand, regardless of the legal verdict.

Some of the statistics that are not in dispute from DryShips’ alliance with Kalani in 2016 and 2017 remain relevant to shareholder perception of the sector on governance, even now that DryShips founder Economou has taken his former public company private.

"Over the course of the financings, DryShips’ share value declined 99.999%. The value of 100,000 shares purchased on 8 June 2016 at $1.19 each for $119,000 total would have declined to just $1.05 at the end of 2017," the shareholders argued in the complaint.

"DryShips executed eight reverse splits within 18 months that achieved a cumulative split factor of 11.8m shares for one share. Over the same period, Kalani made five so-called 'PIPE' purchases of DryShips shares — private investment in public equity – worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

All three lawsuits focus on the financing of the Greek shipowners by Kalani, a firm based in the British Virgin Islands and controlled by Toronto-­based Marc Bistricer and his hedge fund, Murchison Ltd.

Proceeds received from shares sales by the three companies ranged from the $700m taken in by DryShips to just $141,000 by Diana Containerships. Top Ships had received about $90m, according to court filings.

DryShips’ lawyers have defended the fundraising on the basis that it allowed a financially struggling company to not only remain alive, but rebuild its fleet. As with Top Ships, all transactions were described in public filings with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

In one change from earlier versions of the complaint, plaintiffs presented research showing it has been highly unusual historically for companies in any industry raising funds through PIPE offerings to simultaneously conduct as many reverse shares splits as did DryShips.

Indeed, over a 30-year period from 1980, DryShips is the only one to have carried out as many as eight such deals, the complaint alleges. No other company carried out more than five.

Plaintiffs also remind the court that both DryShips and Top Ships have been under investigation by the SEC for the Kalani dealings, asserting that they believe both probes remain open.

Brown’s eventual decision on the latest complaint is expected to also apply to the shareholder charges against Diana Containerships, now known as Performance Shipping.