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Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Portfolio and Security Analysis

Short selling

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Full-Text Articles in Business

Can Shorts Predict Returns? A Global Perspective, Ekkehart Boehmer, Zsuzsa R. Huszar, Yanchu Wang, Xiaoyan Zhang, Xinran Zhang May 2022

Can Shorts Predict Returns? A Global Perspective, Ekkehart Boehmer, Zsuzsa R. Huszar, Yanchu Wang, Xiaoyan Zhang, Xinran Zhang

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Using multiple short-sale measures, we examine the predictive power of short sales for future stock returns in 38 countries from July 2006 to December 2014. We find that the days-to-cover ratio and the utilization ratio measures have the most robust predictive power for future stock returns in the global capital market. Our results display significant cross-country and cross-firm differences in the predictive power of alternative short-sale measures. The predictive power of shorts is stronger in countries with nonprohibitive short sale regulations and for stocks with relatively low liquidity, high shorting fees, and low price efficiency.


Is The Synthetic Stock Price Really Lower Than Actual Price?, Jianfeng Hu Dec 2020

Is The Synthetic Stock Price Really Lower Than Actual Price?, Jianfeng Hu

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Conventional wisdom suggests synthetic stock prices are lower than actual prices due to short‐sale constraints and voting premiums. This study finds that such underpricing of the synthetic midquote disappears if arbitrageurs face security borrowing costs. The synthetic spread predominantly contains the actual spread. Synthetic stock overpricing is as common as underpricing but the former is more persistent and more profitable. The difference between synthetic and actual quotes is significantly affected by options market makers' hedging costs and investors' demand for leverage.


What Do Short Sellers Know?, Ekkehart Boehmer, Charles M. Jones, Juan (Julie) Wu, Xiaoyan Zhang Nov 2020

What Do Short Sellers Know?, Ekkehart Boehmer, Charles M. Jones, Juan (Julie) Wu, Xiaoyan Zhang

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Using NYSE short-sale order data, we investigate whether short sellers' informational advantage is related to firm earnings and analyst-related events. With a novel decomposition method, we find that while these fundamental event days constitute only 12% of sample days, they account for over 24% of the overall underperformance of heavily shorted stocks. Importantly, short sellers use both public news and private information to anticipate news regarding earnings and analysts. Shorting's predictive ability remains significant after controlling for information in analyst actions and displays no reversal patterns, indicating that short sellers know more than analysts, and the nature of their information …


The Trend In Short Selling And The Cross Section Of Stock Returns, Zhaobo Zhu, Xinrui Duan, Jun Tu Nov 2019

The Trend In Short Selling And The Cross Section Of Stock Returns, Zhaobo Zhu, Xinrui Duan, Jun Tu

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

This paper documents that stocks with a decreasing (increasing) trend in their short selling as proxied by the long-term change in short interest experience significant and positive (negative) abnormal returns. Moreover, the positive abnormal returns have larger absolute values and are more persistent. The return predictability of the trend in short selling is not subsumed by the level of short interest and other well-known determinants of stock returns. Investor sentiment does not affect the profitability of the trend strategy. Our results suggest that market participants underreact to public information on short interest and that short sellers are sophisticated investors.


Momentum And Reversal: The Role Of Short Selling, Zhaobo Zhu, Xinrui Duan, Licheng Sun, Jun Tu Jul 2019

Momentum And Reversal: The Role Of Short Selling, Zhaobo Zhu, Xinrui Duan, Licheng Sun, Jun Tu

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

This paper investigates the relation between short selling and momentum. We document that a consistent momentum strategy that buys lightly shorted winners and sells heavily shorted losers exhibits strong short-term momentum and no long-term reversal. In contrast, an inconsistent momentum strategy that buys heavily shorted winners and sells lightly shorted losers experiences weak short-term momentum and persistent long-term reversal. Our results are robust after controlling for firm characteristics, proxy for short-sale constraints, and investor sentiment, as well as an exogenous shock (the Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997). These findings present a new challenge to existing theories of momentum that rely …


Short Selling And The Price Discovery Process, Ekkehart Boehmer, Juan Julie Wu Feb 2013

Short Selling And The Price Discovery Process, Ekkehart Boehmer, Juan Julie Wu

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

We show that stock prices are more accurate when short sellers are more active. First, in a large panel of NYSE-listed stocks, intraday informational efficiency of prices improves with greater shorting flow. Second, at monthly and annual horizons, more shorting flow accelerates the incorporation of public information into prices. Third, greater shorting flow reduces post-earnings-announcement drift for negative earnings surprises. Fourth, short sellers change their trading around extreme return events in a way that aids price discovery and reduces divergence from fundamental values. These results are robust to various econometric specifications, and their magnitude is economically meaningful.


Which Shorts Are Informed?, Ekkehart Boehmer, Charles M. Jones, Xiaoyan Zhang Apr 2008

Which Shorts Are Informed?, Ekkehart Boehmer, Charles M. Jones, Xiaoyan Zhang

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

We construct a long daily panel of short sales using proprietary NYSE order data. From 2000 to 2004, shorting accounts for more than 12.9% of NYSE volume, suggesting that shorting constraints are not widespread. As a group, these short sellers are well informed. Heavily shorted stocks underperform lightly shorted stocks by a risk-adjusted average of 1.16% over the following 20 trading days (15.6% annualized). Institutional nonprogram short sales are the most informative; stocks heavily shorted by institutions underperform by 1.43% the next month (19.6% annualized). The results indicate that, on average, short sellers are important contributors to efficient stock prices.