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Investing

NYSE Short Interest: Bets Against Financial Firms Rises

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By Douglas A. McIntyre Published
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Short interest in companies traded on the NYSE increased for a number of financial firms based on positions as of February 15. The data compares to numbers on January 31

Shares sold short in Citigroup (NYSE: C) rose 10.9 million shares to 92.8 million. Shares short in Bank of America (NYSE: BAC) moved up 6.3 million to 68.8 million. Shares sold short in Wachovia (NYSE: WB) jumped 16.3 million to 96.8 million. Shares short in Fannie Mae (NYSE: FNM) increased by 8.8 million to 51.8 million.

Other significant short stakes:

Largest positions in shares sold short

Company                                               Shares Short

Ford (NYSE: F)                                      216.3 million shares short

Washington Mutual (NYSE: WM)            148,4 million

Countrywide  (NYSE: CFC)                     103.1 million

Wachovia                                                96.8 million

Wells Fargo (NYSE: WFC)                       96.5 million

Citigroup                                                 92.8 million

Qwest (NYSE: Q)                                    92.0 million

AMD (NYSE: AMD)                                 89.8 million

Micron (NYSE: MU)                                 80.6 million

Bank of Amerca                                       68.8 million

Home Depot (NYSE: HD)                          65.2 million

GM (NYSE: GM)                                      63.4 million

EMC (NYSE: EMC)                                  63.2 million

Largest Increases In Short Position

Washington Mutual                                  17.6 million increase

Wachovia                                                16.3 million

Citigroup                                                 10.9 million

CItadel                                                    10.9 million

Freddie Mac (NYSE: FRE)                         9.7 million

Qwest (NYSE:Q)                                       9.6 million

AT&T (NYSE: T)                                        9.5 million

Decrease In Short Interest

Best Buy  (NYSE: BBY)                           19.7 million drop

Rite Aid                                                   19.6 million

Countrywide                                             10.0 million

MBIA (NYSE: MBI)                                    8.5 million

Mirant                                                      7.4 million

Motorola (NYSE: MOT)                              6.5 million

Texas Instrument (NYSE: TXN)                   6.5 million

GE (NYSE:GE)                                         6.5 million

Data from NYSE and WSJ

Douglas A. McIntyre          

Photo of Douglas A. McIntyre
About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.

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