We study the effects that the ban on short sales of shares in financial firms introduced in late 2008 and removed early 2009 had on the microstructure and the quality of UK equity markets. We show that the ban did nothing to affect order flows: financial stocks were being more aggressively sold...

We examine the effect of single-stock futures (SSFs) trading on the price discovery and market quality of underlying stocks during the 2008 short-selling ban. We find a significant increase in SSFs trading volume for banned stocks during the ban period. We show that the contribution of SSFs...

A stock's inclusion in an ETF has the potential to reduce its short sale constraints by decreasing search costs and lowering recall risk. This paper examines how the introduction of ETFs impacts short interest levels of their constituent stocks. We find that short selling in the underlying...

We find that both institutional owners and short sellers decrease their positions prior to earnings announcements, and increase their positions in the post-announcement period. Pre-announcement changes in institutional holdings and short interest have significant explanatory power with respect...

Our study suggests that despite the enforcement of insider trading laws, there are still some investors trading on their private information. Using account-level information, we show that some retail investors seem to be informed about particular stocks. When they sell short these stocks, they...

Using short sell transactions data from 2010 to 2016, this paper is the first to provide a comprehensive sample of short selling initiated by retail investors. We find that retail short selling can predict negative stock returns. A trading strategy that mimics weekly retail shorting earns an...

This study exploits a complex information setting of a network of customer-supplier relationships to test whether short sellers pay attention to corporate news to act upon this news across the supply chain. We measure revealed short seller attention by using the link between a customer's news...

Brokers have access to order-flow data, which they can use to enhance the returns they earn from short selling. However, brokers also have a fiduciary duty to place their clients’ interests before their own. We test whether brokers exploit their informational advantage and earn larger returns...

We examine the role of strategic communication in public short selling campaigns by hedge funds. Such campaigns are associated with abnormal returns for targets of approximately -7% as well as changes in the behavior of stakeholders (e.g., other short sellers). The effects are driven by...

I investigate whether the relation between investor sentiment and profitable trading strategies is due to short sale constraints. I find that the average security in these strategies is not hard-to-short. Furthermore, the short leg does not appear to be harder to short or more overvalued than...