Friday, March 7, 2014

"As Tesla Cools, A Few Brave Shorts Creep Back In" (TSLA)

The stock closed at $246.21, down $6.73. Here's the last month's action via Yahoo Finance:
Chart forTesla Motors, Inc. (TSLA)
From MoneyBeat:
After a 32% rally in the past month, Tesla Motors Inc.TSLA -2.66% shares finally seem to have found their plateau, at least for the moment. The stock is little changed in the past five sessions, up just 1%, at around $247.

Also finding their level: Traders betting against Tesla. Short-selling of the stock plunged over the course of the past year, as Tesla’s persistent rally has made it harder to justify betting against it. Now, it is beginning to tick up again, though just a smidge.

Last March, nearly 25% of Tesla shares available to be borrowed by shorts were loaned out, according to Markit. (Short sellers borrow stock to sell it, hoping to buy it back later at a lower price.) The measure fell through 2013, and went from 17% at the beginning of 2014 to just 11% in February. Now, in the past week, it has edged back up to just under 13%, Markit data showed.

That drop in short-selling was critical, because it played a part in enabling Tesla to complete a giant convertible bond offering last week, according to traders and people familiar with the company’s thinking.
The link between the two lies in how some traders play the convert market. These traders, often hedge funds, want to get a pure-play exposure to Tesla’s credit, which is the interest-paying component of the convertible. What they don’t want is exposure to the stock price, which is the part of the convertible that can be exchanged for shares....MORE
There's one more wrinkle in the convertible story we'll get to next week.