Short Interest Spike Presages Furious Sell-Off and Rally in Psychology/Sentiment | Technical Analysis | Trading http://bigpicture.typepad.com/
One more on how shorts can feul an over the top rally.
For nimble traders only: The last time the New York Stock Exchange short interest ratio broke below a key trendline, the U.S. equity market had a short and sharp selloff -- one that was later followed by a major upside blow-off
The gray area on the chart is SPX; Blue line is NYSE short interest: <spacer>
Shortinterestspx
Source: Michael Panzner, Rabo Securities USA
On the basis of monthly short interest data for the period ending October 14th (released yesterday by the NYSE) and average daily volume for the first two weeks of the month, the most recent SI reported works out to approximately 4.74 days.
That is the lowest level since January 2004. This places a measure below a major uptrend dating back to the September 2001 lows.
Michael Panzner asks: "Time for deja vu all over again?"