Short Interest on S&P 500 Marks 1-Year Low

Traders betting against the S&P 500 index fell to a one-year low today, underscoring the bullish investor sentiment which has now boosted stocks by just under 5% in December.

A reading of short interest in the S&P 500 during the last two weeks of trading fell to 7.29 billion shares, or to about 4.15% of shares available for trading. The data point marks a 2.9% decline from the prior two-week reading.

Notably, short sellers sharply reduced downside bets on stocks in the communications and consumer discretionary sectors. Short interest in phone stocks tumbled about 12%, while short interest in the latter group fell about 8.7%.

As a Bloomberg article from earlier highlighted, Sears Holdings (Nasdaq: SHLD) and First Solar (Nasdaq: FSLR) were the stocks with the largest short interest on the S&P 500.

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