As of April 2020, GME was listed as the most heavily shorted stock in the market – among companies with a market cap of at least $250 million – with 86.9% of shares reported short. As of yesterday, February 15th, GameStop has 17.5% of its shares sold short and, most importantly, is well below the market shorting average. That is a huge flip that proves the credibility gained by GME in less than two years.
The listed companies highlighted in the report above are the most heavily shorted stocks, highlighting a volatile and unpredictable stock market environment. As this report above was compiled in April 2020, just immediately after the pandemic was announced, the pessimism behind this data is justifiable. However, the important fact is that GameStop was the top one in this list due to poor investor credibility, often attacked by the press as a “Meme stock” or a “Reddit event.”
The average market cap of these companies listed is only $1 billion, but their average short interest is 31% which means that they are being held by someone who wishes to sell them. In addition, their shortest-term returns (YTD) have also been quite poor (-32%).
The article we took as reference for these statistics also reports: “The market is very bearish on GameStop given its business concept of selling video games and related hardware at brick and mortar stores even as the industry is moving towards digital.” Today, instead, we have titled our article: “The market is very bullish on GameStop: GME shorting is now down to 17.5% from 89.9%.” Additionally, GameStop is now trading at $126,16. A 2485% increase in price compared to its price during the article’s publication (April 17th, 2020), a massive gain for a “bullish” market!
