Shorts were out in force, however, betting against companies which have experienced earnings and stock market success. High on this list were Starbucks Corporation (NASDAQ: SBUX), which had a 40% increase in shares short to 10.7 million shares, and Sirius XM Radio Inc., (NASDAQ: SIRI) which had a 30% increase to 209.1 million shares short.Other major companies that had large increase short bets included Adobe System Incorporated (NASAQ: ADBE), which is in a fight with Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) over video formats. Its short interest rose 37% to 11.1 million shares. Shorts also took a large position in N0.2 chip maker Advanced Micro Devices (NYSE: AMD), up 25% to 51.8 million.
Short seller decreased their bets against a number of other large companies. The short interest in Sprint-Nextel (NYSE: S), which is in the midst of rolling out its WiMax 4G network, fell 19% to 109 million shares. Shares short in Motorola Inc. (NYSE: MOT), which is gaining back handset share with its Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) Android-based phone, watched its short interest fell 23% to 41.8 million. Share short in handset rival Nokia NYSE: NOK) dropped 17% to 72.6 mill;ion shares.
Shorts pulled out of several large tech firms. The short interest in NVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA) fell 29% to 23.3 million shares. Share short in Oracle (NASDAQ: ORCL) fell 24% to 25.3 million despite the fact that CEO Larry Ellison sold some of his position. Shares short in Dell Inc. (NASDAQ: DELL) fell 11% to 51.2 million. Shares sold short in Cisco Systems Inc. (NASDAQ: CSCO) fell by 11% to 40.3 million. And the short interest in Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) dropped 6% to 66 million
Data from NYSE and NASDAQ.
Douglas A. McIntyre
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