The short interest data is out using the April 30 settlement date.  We have seen some drastic changes from the April 13 settlement date in many issues, followed by some surprises where the short sellers seemed to be absent in other cult stocks and controversial stocks.  Earnings season may have greatly influenced the short selling ambitions and the most recent choppiness and selling in the markets may show more changes ahead.

24/7 Wall St. screened out selective short interest data with the latest changes from the settlement date of April 30, 2012 versus the prior April 13, 2012 in shares of the following: Alcatel Lucent S.A. (NYSE: ALU); Banco Santander, S.A. (NYSE: STD); Bank of America Corporation (NYSE: BAC); Barnes & Noble, Inc. (NYSE: BKS); Dendreon Corporation (NASDAQ: DNDN); Diamond Foods, Inc. (NASDAQ: DMND); First Solar, Inc. (NASDAQ: FSLR); Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, Inc. (NASDAQ: GMCR); Groupon, Inc. (NASDAQ: GRPN); Human Genome Sciences, Inc. (NASDAQ: HGSI); LinkedIn Corporation (NYSE: LNKD); Netflix, Inc. (NASDAQ: NFLX); RadioShack Corporation (NYSE: RSH); Research in Motion Limited (NASDAQ: RIMM); and Sirius XM Radio Inc. (NASDAQ: SIRI).   Does this make for a “Short-Sell in May and go away!” theme?  The short interest changes are for the April 13 versus March 30 settlement dates, with selective color added if applicable:   Alcatel Lucent S.A. (NYSE: ALU) saw another rise in the short interest but this gain was massive by over 25% to 28.67 million shares in the short interest.  Based on its earnings botch, the short sellers made some real money here.

Banco Santander, S.A. (NYSE: STD) is not one of our usual short interest names but investors are back to betting against Spain and the PIIGS all over again now that austerity measures are being fought publicly.  The prior gain was a whopping 214% gain in the short interest to 55.7 million shares and the newest gain was only 2.5% to 57.1 million shares.

Bank of America (NYSE: BAC) is back to seeing a rise in the short interest after a prior drop.  Short sellers lifted the short interest by 9.9% to 142.3 million shares.

Barnes & Noble, Inc. (NYSE: BKS) saw a small increase ion its short interest, which you know helped to exacerbate that pop from the Microsoft deal while activist investors press on here.  The short interest rose another 3.7% to 19.768 million shares.

Dendreon Corporation (NASDAQ: DNDN) saw another decent drop with the end of April showing a short interest drop of -8.3% to 32.95 million shares.  This is still about 4-days of equivalent share volume in the short interest as of the end of April.

Diamond Foods, Inc. (NASDAQ: DMND) is still a battleground stock but its short interest appears to have already peaked.  With mid-April showing only a 1.4% gain in the short interest, the end of April’s short interest data showed a gain of only 0.2% to 11.48 million shares.

First Solar, Inc. (NASDAQ: FSLR) keeps hitting new all-time lows and the short interest had been growing.  The end of April settlement data increased by only 2.8% to 23.7 million shares in its short interest.

Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, Inc. (NASDAQ: GMCR) has been seeing a prior rise in the short interest again, but the end of April was only a 4.1% gain to 29.17 million shares.  This is higher than earlier in the year but well down from last year’s more active short selling.

Groupon, Inc. (NASDAQ: GRPN) saw another large drop in the short selling as of the end of April settlement date with a drop of -9.3% to 17.427 million shares.

Human Genome Sciences, Inc. (NASDAQ: HGSI) is one where the short sellers are getting out of the way under a possible deal.  The short interest at the end of April fell by a whopping 44% down to 25.9 million shares from a mid-April level of over 46.4 million shares short.

LinkedIn Corporation (NYSE: LNKD) has been muted in the short interest of late but the most recent settlement data at the end of April showed that the shorts picked up their activity with a 6.4% gain in the short interest to 4.659 million shares.  That is still down about one-third from earlier in the year but it is still over a full day’s worth of trading volume.

Netflix, Inc. (NASDAQ: NFLX) is back in the interest of short sellers with the gains in the end of April’s short interest rising another 14.5% to 11.639 million shares.

Nokia Corporation (NYSE: NOK) appears to be one where the short sellers have started taking their profits.  The end of April settlement data showed a drop of over 14% down to 195.14 million shares in the short interest.  With shares so low, maybe all the easy money has been made.

Radioshack Corporation (NYSE: RSH) is one where the short sellers have been winning and where the short interest had been growing.  Apparently they are starting to think all of the easy money on the short-sale side has been made.  The end of April settlement date brought a small drop of -1.2% to 35.4 million shares.  Keep in mind that this is over 7-days of equivalent trading volume.

Research in Motion Limited (NASDAQ: RIMM) may still be down and out, but short sellers are not pressing their bets any longer it seems.  After a drop in the mid-April drop we see that the end of April’s short interest fell by another 5.4% down to 53.7 million shares.

Sirius XM Radio Inc. (NASDAQ: SIRI) was down a bit more at the end of April with the short interest being down 4.8% at 271.2 million shares.  This may reflect the Liberty/Malone efforts and the short interest is down from a peak of more than 300 million shares short in mid-March.

JON C. OGG

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