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Investing

Short Sellers Increase Bets Against Telecom

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By Douglas A. McIntyre Updated Published
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Short sellers made bets across the board against the telecom industry for the period that ended January 15. Investors may be worried about price wars amongh carriers and handset companies as they fight for market share in a market of increased numbers of products and new operating systems like Google Android. AT&T and Verizon Wireless have recently begun competition based on lowering subscriber fees.

The short interest in Motorola (NYSE:MOT) rose 52% to 57.9 million shares. Shares short in Qwest (NYSE:Q) rose 15% to 76.1 million. The short interest in AT&T (NYSE:T) rose 14% to 64 million. Shares short in Sprint (NYSE:S) were up 5% to 97.1 million. The short interest in MetroPCS (NYSE:PCS) rose 13% to 24.8 million. Shares short in Palm (NASDAQ:PALM) were up 18% to 73.9 million. The short interest in cellphone chip provider Qualcomm (NASDAQ:QCOM) was higher by 8% to 28.1 million. Shares short in RIM (NASDAQ:RIMM) were up 14% to 16.6 million. The short interest in Vodafone (NYSE:VOD) was up 34% to 7.6 million.

Among widely traded stocks listed on the NYSE, the short interest in Ford (NYSE:F) rose 25% to 103.4 million shares. Shares sold short in Exxon Mobil (NYSE:XOM) rose 31% to 71.9 million. The short interest in Disney (NYSE:DIS) fell 23% to 48.6 million.

Large changes among stocks traded on NASDAQ include an increase in the short interest in Electronic Arts (NASDAQ:ERTS) of 18% to 26.6 million. Shares sold short in DryShips (NASSAQ:DRYS) rose 53% to 13.9 million. Shares sold short in Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) were down 15% to 54.8 million.

Data from NYSE and NASDAQ.

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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