IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jfinec/v96y2010i1p80-97.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The good news in short interest

Author

Listed:
  • Boehmer, Ekkehart
  • Huszar, Zsuzsa R.
  • Jordan, Bradford D.

Abstract

Stocks with relatively high short interest subsequently experience negative abnormal returns, but the effect can be transient and of debatable economic significance. In contrast, relatively heavily traded stocks with low short interest experience both statistically and economically significant positive abnormal returns. These positive returns are often larger (in absolute value) than the negative returns observed for heavily shorted stocks. Thus, the positive information associated with low short interest, which is publicly available, is only slowly incorporated into prices, which raises a broader market efficiency issue. Our results also cast doubt on existing theories of the impact of short sale constraints.

Suggested Citation

  • Boehmer, Ekkehart & Huszar, Zsuzsa R. & Jordan, Bradford D., 2010. "The good news in short interest," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(1), pages 80-97, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jfinec:v:96:y:2010:i:1:p:80-97
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0304-405X(09)00240-2
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Honghui Chen & Vijay Singal, 2003. "Role of Speculative Short Sales in Price Formation: The Case of the Weekend Effect," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 58(2), pages 685-705, April.
    2. Karl B. Diether & Kuan-Hui Lee & Ingrid M. Werner, 2009. "Short-Sale Strategies and Return Predictability," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(2), pages 575-607, February.
    3. Harrison Hong & Jeremy C. Stein, 2003. "Differences of Opinion, Short-Sales Constraints, and Market Crashes," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 16(2), pages 487-525.
    4. Honghui Chen & Vijay Singal, 2003. "Role of Speculative Short Sales in Price Formation: The Case of the Weekend Effect," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 58(2), pages 685-706, April.
    5. Joseph J. Seneca, 1967. "Short Interest: Bearish Or Bullish?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 22(1), pages 67-70, March.
    6. Chen, Joseph & Hong, Harrison & Stein, Jeremy C., 2002. "Breadth of ownership and stock returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(2-3), pages 171-205.
    7. Brent, Averil & Morse, Dale & Stice, E. Kay, 1990. "Short Interest: Explanations and Tests," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 25(2), pages 273-289, June.
    8. Carhart, Mark M, 1997. "On Persistence in Mutual Fund Performance," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(1), pages 57-82, March.
    9. Hemang Desai & K. Ramesh & S. Ramu Thiagarajan & Bala V. Balachandran, 2002. "An Investigation of the Informational Role of Short Interest in the Nasdaq Market," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 57(5), pages 2263-2287, October.
    10. Lauren Cohen & Karl B. Diether & Christopher J. Malloy, 2007. "Supply and Demand Shifts in the Shorting Market," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 62(5), pages 2061-2096, October.
    11. Ernan Haruvy & Charles N. Noussair, 2006. "The Effect of Short Selling on Bubbles and Crashes in Experimental Spot Asset Markets," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 61(3), pages 1119-1157, June.
    12. Michael Gallmeyer & Burton Hollifield, 2008. "An Examination of Heterogeneous Beliefs with a Short-Sale Constraint in a Dynamic Economy," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 12(2), pages 323-364.
    13. Senchack, A. J. & Starks, Laura T., 1993. "Short-Sale Restrictions and Market Reaction to Short-Interest Announcements," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 28(2), pages 177-194, June.
    14. Shleifer, Andrei & Vishny, Robert W, 1997. "The Limits of Arbitrage," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(1), pages 35-55, March.
    15. Figlewski, Stephen, 1981. "The Informational Effects of Restrictions on Short Sales: Some Empirical Evidence," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 16(4), pages 463-476, November.
    16. Geczy, Christopher C. & Musto, David K. & Reed, Adam V., 2002. "Stocks are special too: an analysis of the equity lending market," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(2-3), pages 241-269.
    17. Fama, Eugene F. & French, Kenneth R., 1993. "Common risk factors in the returns on stocks and bonds," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 3-56, February.
    18. Asquith, Paul & Pathak, Parag A. & Ritter, Jay R., 2005. "Short interest, institutional ownership, and stock returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 78(2), pages 243-276, November.
    19. Ekkehart Boehmer & Charles M. Jones & Xiaoyan Zhang, 2008. "Which Shorts Are Informed?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 63(2), pages 491-527, April.
    20. Diamond, Douglas W. & Verrecchia, Robert E., 1987. "Constraints on short-selling and asset price adjustment to private information," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 18(2), pages 277-311, June.
    21. Boehme, Rodney D. & Danielsen, Bartley R. & Sorescu, Sorin M., 2006. "Short-Sale Constraints, Differences of Opinion, and Overvaluation," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 41(2), pages 455-487, June.
    22. Paul Asquith & Rebecca Oman & Christopher Safaya, 2008. "Short Sales and Trade Classification Algorithms," NBER Working Papers 14158, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    23. Ekkehart Boehmer & Eric K. Kelley, 2009. "Institutional Investors and the Informational Efficiency of Prices," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(9), pages 3563-3594, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Kelley Bergsma & Jitendra Tayal, 2019. "Short Interest and Lottery Stocks," Financial Management, Financial Management Association International, vol. 48(1), pages 187-227, March.
    2. Jank, Stephan & Roling, Christoph & Smajlbegovic, Esad, 2021. "Flying under the radar: The effects of short-sale disclosure rules on investor behavior and stock prices," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 139(1), pages 209-233.
    3. Khan, Mostafa Saidur Rahim & Bremer, Marc & Kato, Hideaki Kiyoshi, 2018. "Are short-sales constraints binding when there is a centralized lendable securities market? Evidence from Japan," Journal of the Japanese and International Economies, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 85-96.
    4. Frino, Alex & Lecce, Steven & Lepone, Andrew, 2011. "Short-sales constraints and market quality: Evidence from the 2008 short-sales bans," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 20(4), pages 225-236, August.
    5. Fellner, Gerlinde & Theissen, Erik, 2014. "Short sale constraints, divergence of opinion and asset prices: Evidence from the laboratory," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 113-127.
    6. Hanauer, Matthias X. & Lesnevski, Pavel & Smajlbegovic, Esad, 2023. "Surprise in short interest," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).
    7. Stratmann, Thomas & Welborn, John W., 2016. "Informed short selling, fails-to-deliver, and abnormal returns," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 38(PA), pages 81-102.
    8. Bohl, Martin T. & Klein, Arne C. & Siklos, Pierre L., 2013. "Are short sellers positive feedback traders? Evidence from the global financial crisis," Journal of Financial Stability, Elsevier, vol. 9(3), pages 337-346.
    9. Lecce, Steven & Lepone, Andrew & McKenzie, Michael D. & Segara, Reuben, 2012. "The impact of naked short selling on the securities lending and equity market," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 15(1), pages 81-107.
    10. Antonio Gargano & Juan Sotes-Paladino & Patrick Verwijmeren, 2022. "Out of Sync: Dispersed Short Selling and the Correction of Mispricing," Working Papers 108, Red Nacional de Investigadores en Economía (RedNIE).
    11. Crystal Xiaobei Chen, 2012. "The anatomy of short sales and price adjustment: evidence from the Hong Kong stock market," International Journal of Managerial Finance, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 8(3), pages 204-218, June.
    12. Wang, Xue & Yan, Xuemin (Sterling) & Zheng, Lingling, 2020. "Shorting flows, public disclosure, and market efficiency," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 135(1), pages 191-212.
    13. Comerton-Forde, Carole & Do, Binh Huu & Gray, Philip & Manton, Tom, 2016. "Assessing the information content of short-selling metrics using daily disclosures," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 188-204.
    14. Gibbs, Michael & Hao, (Grace) Qing, 2018. "Short selling around the expiration of IPO share lockups," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 88(C), pages 30-43.
    15. Wang, Yuchen & Wang, Xiaoming, 2023. "Economic policy uncertainty and information intermediary: The case of short seller," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 120(C).
    16. Melissa Porras Prado & Pedro A. C. Saffi & Jason Sturgess, 2016. "Ownership Structure, Limits to Arbitrage, and Stock Returns: Evidence from Equity Lending Markets," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 29(12), pages 3211-3244.
    17. Chung, Chune Young & DeVault, Luke & Wang, Kainan, 2019. "Perceived information, short interest, and institutional demand," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 22-38.
    18. Blau, Benjamin M. & Cox, Justin S. & Griffith, Todd G. & Voges, Ryan, 2023. "Daily short selling around reverse stock splits," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).
    19. Adrian W. K. Cheung & Hung Wan Kot & Eric F. Y. Lam & Harry K. M. Leung, 2020. "Toward understanding short‐selling activity: demand and supply," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 60(3), pages 2203-2230, September.
    20. Antonio Gargano & Juan Sotes-Paladino & Patrick Verwijmeren, 2022. "Short of Capital: Stock Market Implications of Short Sellers’ Losses," Working Papers 116, Red Nacional de Investigadores en Economía (RedNIE).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:jfinec:v:96:y:2010:i:1:p:80-97. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/505576 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.