Short sellers are often viewed by the investing public as more than just an interesting breed. Sometimes, particularly in bear markets or during market corrections, short sellers are simply hated. After all, they are betting against the market or are betting against a stock or a sector. So what are investors supposed to make of it when short sellers are increasing their bets against Warren Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-B)?

On top of betting against Berkshire Hathaway, it turns out that short sellers went even further by betting harder against the Oracle of Omaha’s top public stock holdings. Isn’t Buffett supposed to be considered the greatest investor of all time?

The reasons may be fleeting as to “why” short sellers have increased their bets against Buffett. The end result is that short sellers have increased their bets against him and his top four stocks. As a reminder, those four top stock holdings alone account for over half of the total Berkshire Hathaway public stock holdings.

Buffett’s top four holdings are American Express Co. (NYSE: AXP), Coca-Cola Co. (NYSE: KO), International Business Machines Corp. (NYSE: IBM) and Wells Fargo & Co. (NYSE: WFC).

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24/7 Wall St. has compared the closing price of Tuesday to the February 27 settlement date to see what has happened over the past month. Maybe comparing the short interest dates directly could have been used, but this tries to interpret what short sellers are doing in general on a “now versus then” basis rather than comparing old dates to older dates. Color has been added on each, pitting short seller bets against the total stakes of each stock held by Buffett.

American Express

This company saw its short interest rise by 10.4% to 11.695 million with about two days to cover. What is interesting here is that Berkshire Hathaway owns about 151 million shares of American Express. That makes this total short interest seem irrelevant on the surface. After all, Buffett owns almost 13 times more shares than all the short sellers have had to borrow to bet against the company.

American Express shares were down by 0.2% from the last short interest report. The stock has a consensus analyst price target of $87.40 and a 52-week trading range of $77.12 to $96.24.

Coca-Cola

The short interest in Coca-Cola increased by a sharp 13.4% to 36.734 million shares. Its days to cover is roughly three. The previous reading was 32.398 million shares at the end of February. Coca-Cola is another instance in which short sellers may seem irrelevant to Buffett. After all, Buffett’s stake in Coca-Cola is a very old stake, and it is close to 400 million shares. So Buffett’s longstanding investment here is more than 12 times the value of the current short interest as a whole.

Where this short interest increase in Coca-Cola shares gets interesting is that the closing price on Tuesday was over 5% lower than the same closing price from settlement date at the end of February. The stock has a consensus price target of $45.26 and a 52-week trading range of $38.04 to $45.00.

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IBM

IBM saw its short interest jump 14.6% by the March 13 settlement date from the February 27 settlement date. The new short interest is listed as 24.315 million shares, with about five days to cover, versus 21.214 million shares at the end of February. In his most recent holdings report, Buffett’s stake was listed as 76.97 million shares.

So, Buffett’s total stake is more than three times the entire short interest in IBM. One thing that Buffett has in common with the short sellers, although in an opposite bet, is that both he and the short sellers have added more shares to their bets. Short sellers see what may be endless growth problems at IBM, while Buffett loves its valuation and buybacks.

IBM shares closed at $163.00 on Tuesday, which puts the stock’s performance up by 0.6% compared to the February 27 prior settlement date. IBM’s 52-week trading range is $149.52 to $199.21, and the consensus price target is $158.45.

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Wells Fargo

Wells Fargo saw its short interest gain as well from the end of February to mid-March. This was the smallest gain of all the top Buffett positions at 0.2% higher. March’s first short interest reading was 33.326 million shares, and this represented about two days to cover.

Buffett seems to have halted his accumulation of Wells Fargo shares. Still, he holds over 463 million shares of the nation’s top mortgage lender. That means that Buffett’s investment is currently worth almost 14 times that of the entire crowd of short sellers.

Shares of Wells Fargo were at $55.35 as of Tuesday’s close, which is up 1% from the February 27 closing price. Wells Fargo has a 52-week trading range of $46.44 to $56.29 and a consensus price target of $56.87.

Berkshire Hathaway

Now that we have seen the core holdings of Buffett against the short interest, what about the Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-B) short interest itself? The B-shares saw the short interest rise by 6.9% to 10.554 million shares, with about three days to cover.

Berkshire Hathaway shares were trading at $144.29 as of Tuesday’s close, which is down 2.1% from the $147.41 closing price from the February 27 settlement date. The B-shares have a 52-week trading range of $121.09 to $152.94.

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It is widely known that Buffett loves to add shares, or at least make money off of his holdings, if he can. Buffett also welcomes anyone who bets against him, likely because it makes the market more efficient through time. One might wonder if Buffett has gone as far as to request that short sellers come directly to him so that he can charge the margin interest for the borrowing cost that short sellers have to pay. Oh, and as a reminder, short sellers are also on the hook for paying out a company’s dividend.

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