Apple’s (AAPL) Short Interest Nosedives

Recent short interest data for the 12/15/2014 settlement date shows a significant decrease in short interest for shares of Apple Inc. (AAPL). As of December 15, the short interest for the iPhone maker totaled 53,673,391 shares, as compared to 78,182,668 shares since November 28, a decline of 31.35%. The drop was more than that of any other name traded on Nasdaq in the most recently reported period. Average daily volume [AVM] rose by 8,044,863 to 54,205,753 shares from 46,160,890 shares. It is worth mentioning that ticker’s short interest has plunged by more than 84M shares, or about 62%, from the 9/15/2014 settlement date.

Based on the latest AVM, the days-to-cover ratio — a metric that includes both the total shares short and the average daily volume of shares traded — is currently 1.00 days. Days-to-cover for AAPL decreased to 1.00 for the December 15 settlement date, as compared to 1.69 days at the November 28 report.

Recently, a number of Wall Street firms have assigned a rating to the stock. Analysts at Citigroup (C) maintained a ‘Buy’ rating and a $135 price target in a research note on December 8th. JMP Securities analysts maintained a ‘Market Outperform’ rating and $150 price target in a research note to clients on December 3. Finally, analysts at Canaccord Genuity maintained a ‘Buy’ and $135 price target on Apple shares in a research note on Dec. 2nd. Overall, there are 24 analysts that rate AAPL a ‘Buy’, while 9 rate it a ‘Hold’. No analyst rates it a ‘Sell’. AAPL has a median Wall Street price target of $122.00 with a high target of $150.00.

Apple Inc. has a beta of 1.25 and a short float of 0.92%. In the past 52 weeks, shares of Cupertino, California-based tech giant have traded between a low of $70.51 and a high of $119.75 and are now at $113.84. AAPL has rallied over 41% this year with the release of several new models and its long-awaited iWatch.

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