Photo by Maxim Hopman on Unsplash

This week's update outlines whether the "Shorters" (the big institutional players who have heavily shorted 25 stocks) or the "Squeezers" (small retail speculators who are making an effort to drive the shorted stocks up in price to thwart the shorters) are winning the "game". 

My initial article on the subject (see here) explained all things short stock related, namely:

1. Why Do Speculators 'Short' Stocks?
2. How Do You Short A Stock?
3. What Is Short Volume?
4. What Is Short Interest?
5. What Is A Short Squeeze?

15 stocks have short sales in excess of 30% of total shares, namely: Arch Resources, Beam Global, Bed bath & Beyond, Beyond Meat, Big 5 Sporting, Blink Charging, Cassava Sciences, Citi Trends, Cortexyme, Gogo, Intercept Pharma, iStar, Lemonade and SmileDirectClub.

10 stocks have short sales in excess of 25% of total shares, namely: Biofrontera, Lordstown Motors, Nokola, Ocugen, Rite Aid, Romeo Power, Shift Technologies, Vinco Ventures, Vusix and Workhorse Group.

• During the first 10 weeks of the "contest" (from about mid-November, 2021, until the end of January, 2022) the "Squeezers" were still in the formative stage with the "Shorters" being successful in driving the prices of the 25 stocks DOWN by 47%, on average.
• During the month of February the score was: "Shorters" 20; "Squeezers" 5.
• So far in March the February trend has continued with a score of "Shorters" 19; "Squeezers" 6. 
• A week ago there was a complete reversal in the score to "Squeezers" 23; "Shorters" 2.
• This past week, however, the score reverted to "Shorters" 16; "Squeezers" 9.

Below are the 10 stocks with momentum in excess of +15% since the end of January, in descending order, with honorable mention to 2 others that advanced between 10% and 15%:

1. Workhorse Group (WKHS): +49.3% 
2. Gogo (GOGO): +48.2% 
3. Arch Resources (ARCH): +47.1% 
4. Beam Global (BEEM): +45.7% 
5. Bed Bath & Beyond (BBBY): +45.5% 
6. Blink Charging (BLNK): +39.0%
7. Nikola (NKLA): +35.2% 
8. Arcimoto (FUV): +29.4% 
9. Lordstown Motors (RIDE): +27.3%
10. Shift Technologies (SFT): +23.1% 
11. SmileDirectClub (SDC): +15.3% 
12. Ocugen (OCGN): +11.5% 

Conclusion

While all 25 stocks are UP +12.3% since the end of January, they are DOWN -40.4%, on average, from when they were first shorted back in mid-November, 2021, so the "Shorters" continue to win the "game" rather handily.