The short interest in the actively traded cult stocks and also in some of the active low-priced shares can tend to be volatile, to say the least. We tracked some rather large moves up and down in this group for the September 14 settlement date versus the August 31 report.

Here we look at the following active cult stocks and low-priced short interest reports: Alcatel Lucent S.A. (NYSE: ALU), Bank of America Corp. (NYSE: BAC), Barnes & Noble Inc. (NYSE: BKS), Dendreon Corp. (NASDAQ: DNDN), Diamond Foods Inc. (NASDAQ: DMND), Facebook Inc. (NASDAQ: FB), First Solar Inc. (NASDAQ: FSLR), Green Mountain Coffee Roasters Inc. (NASDAQ: GMCR), Groupon Inc. (NASDAQ: GRPN), LinkedIn Corp. (NYSE: LNKD), Netflix Inc. (NASDAQ: NFLX), Nokia Corp. (NYSE: NOK), RadioShack Corp. (NYSE: RSH), Research In Motion Ltd. (NASDAQ: RIMM), Sirius XM Radio Inc. (NASDAQ: SIRI) and Zynga Inc. (NASDAQ: ZNGA).

Alcatel Lucent S.A. (NYSE: ALU) saw a gain in the short selling, but this had previously been the lowest short interest since February. The mid-September reading was 16.511 million shares short versus 14.563 million shares short at the end of August.

Bank of America Corp. (NYSE: BAC) saw a drop yet again to 204.5 million shares short, versus 216.4 million short. That is the lowest short interest since May.

Barnes & Noble Inc. (NYSE: BKS) saw a tiny gain, literally, in the short interest: 11.77 million shares at 9/14 versus 11.76 million at 8/31. This is way down from the peak of almost 20 million shares short earlier this year.

Dendreon Corp. (NASDAQ: DNDN) saw another gain in the short interest to 43.079 million shares short on the 9/14 settlement date, versus 42.317 million shares short on 8/31. This is now 11.3 days to cover.

Diamond Foods Inc. (NASDAQ: DMND) saw yet one more decline as the 9/14 short interest was 8.361 million shares short versus 8.58 million shares short as of 8/31. This has been on a steady decline nominally, but the days to cover is a whopping 24.6.

Facebook Inc. (NASDAQ: FB) saw a gain after a prior drop and the short interest is almost back at the record. The 9/14 settlement date’s short interest was 87.56 million, versus 85.35 million shares short at the 8/31 settlement date. The record short interest was 87.984 million shares short as of the 8/15 settlement date. The days to cover is now 1.5 on Facebook.

First Solar Inc. (NASDAQ: FSLR) saw a slight gain in short selling to 29.6 million shares short, versus 29.3 million shares short at the end of August. The near-term peak was 31.8 million shares short back on August 15. The days to cover is currently 3.25, but that is down from a peak of over 8 at the end of July.

Green Mountain Coffee Roasters Inc. (NASDAQ: GMCR) saw a small downtick in the short interest as the 9/14 settlement date had 40.85 million shares short versus 41.5 million shares short on the 8/31 settlement. This is still near a record nominally, but the days to cover of 4.4 is half of the days to cover at the last report.

Groupon Inc. (NASDAQ: GRPN) saw a decent drop in the short interest as the 9/14 short interest was 37.1 million shares short versus 42.1 shares short on the 8/31 settlement date. The peak was more than 55 million shares short at the end of July.

LinkedIn Corp. (NYSE: LNKD) saw an uptick to 5.27 million shares short as of 9/14 versus 4.87 million shares short on 8/31. This is a high not seen since mid-June, but the days to cover ticked down to 1.9 from 2.2.

Netflix Inc. (NASDAQ: NFLX) saw a small gain in the short interest to 15.555 million shares short as of 9/14, versus the 8/31 short interest of 15.448 million shares. What is interesting is that this is a nominal high in the short interest over the past year, but the days to cover was down to 2.9 from 4.8 in the prior report.

Nokia Corp. (NYSE: NOK) saw a large gain in the short selling. The 9/14 short interest was 315.5 million shares versus 246.2 million shares short at the 8/31 settlement date. This was the largest short interest that we have seen all year n Nokia, but the 3.1 days to cover is nowhere close to a high.

RadioShack Corp. (NYSE: RSH) saw a small gain in the short interest to 41.45 million shares short on the 9/14 date, versus the short interest of 40.9 million shares short at the 8/31 settlement date. This was under the 45+ million shares short record, but was a record for the past year at 16.5 days to cover now that volume has normalized.

Research In Motion Ltd. (NASDAQ: RIMM) saw another slight drop in the short interest to 82.6 million share short as of 9/14, versus the 87.4 million share short as of the 8/31 settlement date. The days to cover is still high at 5.1, but neither the days to cover nor the nominal short interest were close to the highs over the past year.

Sirius XM Radio Inc. (NASDAQ: SIRI) came in at 298.9 million shares short as of the September 14 settlement date, versus 283.1 million shares short of the August 31 settlement date. The peak was almost 330 million shares short over the last year.

Zynga Inc. (NASDAQ: ZNGA) saw a slight drop in the short interest after having seen a large drop in the short interest this summer. The 9/14 settlement date had 18.44 million shares short, versus 18.9 million shares short as of the 8/31 settlement date. The peak was 56 million shares short back in May.

JON C. OGG

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