I'm always bemused at the extent that people concern themselves with what short-sellers may, or may not, be doing at any given point in time, as if short-sellers have some sort of monopoly on being consistently right.
Take NHC as a case in point: in June 2022, a full 6% of NHC's shares had been short sold (around 50m shares). The share price at the time was around $3.70.
Today, just 6 months later, it is 75% higher, and the short position has been reduced to 2% (17.5m shares).
Which means it was short covering that formed part of the buying over the past 6 months, which helped drive the share price up.
I don't know why the actions of shorters cause people such bother, because today's short-seller is also tomorrow's buyer.
In effect, short-sellers try to sell-high and buy-low.
Which is really no different to what other investors do, expect that the timing of the selling and/or buying is reversed.
So, if one does one's homework properly, and one buys and holds fundamentally undervalued businesses, the motivations and actions of short-sellers become irrelevant.
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NHC Price at posting:
$6.38 Sentiment: None Disclosure: Held
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