Did Short Sellers Call This Correction for Apple?

June 12, 2017 by Chris Lange

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) watched its short interest make an incredible gain for the period ended on May 31. Apple’s stock has dropped nearly 8% in the past two trading sessions. Did short sellers call this or see this drop coming ahead of time?

For the period ended May 31, Apple saw its short interest jump to 63.20 million from the previous level of 49.91 million. This is an increase of over 26%.

Recently, Mizuho Securities’ Abhey Lamba clipped his rating for Apple to Neutral from Buy. His concern is that all of Apple’s near-term future success is baked into its share price. That share price is up 29% this year and it trades near an all-time high. Lamba wrote:

The stock has meaningfully outperformed on a YTD basis and we believe enthusiasm around the upcoming product cycle is fully captured at current levels, with limited upside to estimates from here on out.

This is not the first recent downgrade of Apple. As the iPhone 8 release nears, experts wonder if what are expected to be spectacular sales can sustain an already sharp share price increase.

Excluding Monday’s move, Apple is the best-performing Dow stock, with shares up nearly 29% year to date. Over the past 52 weeks, the stock is up closer to 50%.

Shares of Apple were last seen down 3.7% at $143.55 on Monday, with a consensus analyst price target of $157.36 and a 52-week range of $91.50 to $156.65.

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