Clover Health Stock Rally Continues Despite Confusion Over Short Interest

An apparent short squeeze in Clover Health Investments Corp CLOV continued Monday despite the stock apparently having a much smaller short interest than some traders believed last week.

On Thursday, Benzinga covered a report by S3 Partners in which S3 ranked several of the most heavily shorted stocks in the market by their short percent of float.

Clover had by far the highest percentage, at 144.7%. The large number immediately raised eyebrows among some traders, but shares of Clover have ripped higher by nearly 30% since the S3 report came out.

Related Link: 8 Stocks With The Highest Short Percent Of Float

Float Miscalculation: In a tweet on Friday, S3 said FactSet supplies the data for its algorithms.

In the case of Clover, S3 said FactSet was not classifying the CEO’s 83.6 million shares as part of its float, resulting in an extremely high short percent of float.

A FactSet spokesperson told Benzinga Monday that the company "quickly corrected a processing error that occurred in the shares classification for CLOV."

On Monday, S3 followed up with an additional tweet suggesting Clover’s actual short percent of float is 36.9% based on an “updated” float number from FactSet.

“Based on FactSet’s updated and changed Float number for $CLOV, SI % of Float is 36.97% and S3 SI% Float is 26.99%. S3’s own number, its forecast of shares sold short, has remained accurate, and stands at 40.61mm,” S3 said.

Benzinga has reached out to S3 for comment. 

CLOV Price Action: Clover Health shares were up 14.23% at $10.08 at last check. 

Benzinga’s Take: Whether the initial 144% short percent of float for Clover was a mistake or merely an untimely update, it can serve as a lesson that traders should always be skeptical of any metric that seems unrealistic or suspicious.

FactSet is generally an extremely reliable data provider, but the company even has a disclaimer posted on its website that it “does not warrant that the provision of services will be uninterrupted, error free, timely, complete or accurate.”