Short Selling: Short interest in Syrah and Chalice Mining tick higher, GUD and Bapcor shorts ease

Welcome back to the Short Seller Series – A recap of the most heavily shorted stocks on the ASX as well as those experiencing significant changes to short interest over the past week.

Short selling data is four days behind today's date because reporting is not mandatory until three business days after the trade. The tables below compare week-on-week (WoW % Chg) short interest changes between 6 February and 31 January and month-on-month (MoM) % Chg) changes between 6 February and 9 January. The rising and falling short interest ranks stocks based on largest WoW change.

Most Shorted

Key themes and takeaways:

• Pilbara Minerals, Syrah Resources and Core Lithium remain the top three most shorted stocks on the market since late November 2023

• Syrah experienced an uptick in short interest. The stock rallied as much as 40% higher between 7-9 February (the day after our data range). The bulk of the move occurred on 9 February after the company announced active anode material at its Vidalia facility in Louisiana. It will be interesting to see if shorters covered (or added more shorts) into this move.

Rising Shorts

Key themes and takeaways:

• Shorts are increasing in Chalice Mining as the company's Gonneville deposit is expected to generate around 55% of its revenue from palladium. Palladium prices reached a five-and-a-half-year low on Friday, February 9th, down -9% in the past month and by -43% over the past twelve months.

Most Covered

Key themes and takeaways:

• GUD has not released any market sensitive news since its AGM announcement on 26 October 2023. Its peers Bapcor released a challenging 1H24 trading update last month, with a decline in bottom-line profits and sales underperforming expectations. Analysts attributed the decline in profits to lower-than-expected sales, cost inflation and market share losses. GUD is set to report on 14 February

• Bapcor has become increasingly hard to short despite the above update. The AFR noted the company as a "prime candidate for private equity firms looking to put some of their dry powder to work, with a number of investment banks, including Goldman Sachs, pitching the auto parts retailer to private equity clients as a potential takeover target," on 29 January.