The only thing I can come up with is that they are

The only thing I can come up with is that they are mostly wash trades. One MM buys 10k shares from another MM at a price that holds the price down. No brokerage fees to lose (like the rest of us). Just proof of the manipulation in my opinion. Only other reason for a trade of so few shares would be as a partial fill to a bigger order but in that case you could still never explain the number of 10k trades in a day. This manipulation requires a few MM's to work together. The 10k trades are blatant examples of the manipulation. They don't even try to hide it.The average investor never sees these trades. They just see the posted price. Four increasing trades at a higher price followed by one wash trade at a lower price and all the public sees is the lower price. The public assumes the price is going down when it actually is going up.