Sprint Still Has Plenty Of Short Squeeze Potential In 2017

While Verizon Communications Inc. VZ and AT&T Inc. T continue to dominate the U.S. mobile carrier market share, another carrier dominated Wall Street in 2016. Sprint Corp S shares surged 145.8 percent in the past year despite its positioning as the smallest of the “big four” U.S. carriers in terms of subscribers.

A major part of Sprint’s move may be due to the massive number of traders that have been betting on Sprint to fail.

It’s likely no coincidence that the entire time Sprint shares were skyrocketing in the past year, the stock’s short interest was plummeting 36.6 percent. Short sellers have spent much of the last year unwinding their positions, and short covering has contributed a significant amount of Sprint's volume during its run-up.

The good news for Sprint bulls is that there appears to be plenty more potential short covering volume out there. Despite the 2016 short squeeze, Sprit remains one of the most heavily-shorted stocks in the entire NYSE. According to shortsqueeze.com, Sprint still has an elevated short percent of float of 21.7 percent. There are currently a mind-boggling 142.1 million Sprint shares held short with 5.8 days to cover.

If the slow-burn Sprint short squeeze continues in 2017, the stock’s 145 percent one-year gain may only be the beginning.