KOMP, the SPDR S&P Kensho New Economies Composite ETF, enters the week with its most striking data point buried in the trend: short interest has more than halved in a week, yet the ETF still slipped 2.4% on Tuesday alone.
The positioning shift over the past month is hard to ignore. Short interest has fallen roughly 65% over 30 days — from around 68,000 shares short in early July to just 22,400 now, less than 0.06% of float. That is not a crowded short by any measure. Borrow costs have also eased, running at 4.2% — down about 8% on the week and near the low end of the past month's range. Availability tells the same story: at 462%, there are more than four shares available to borrow for every one currently lent out, a dramatic loosening from the sub-90% readings seen in mid-July when the borrow market was genuinely tight. Back then, with utilization running near 90% and availability below 90%, any short seller looking to establish a position faced real friction. That friction has largely evaporated.
The options market adds little drama. The put/call ratio is running at 0.06, essentially flat against its 20-day average of 0.064. The z-score is effectively zero, meaning options traders are neither pressing bearish bets nor loading up on calls. For a thematic ETF tracking AI, clean energy, and cloud names, the absence of any directional conviction in options is notable. The 52-week PCR high of 0.12 — hit briefly in early August — has already faded. What remains is a market that is watching, not positioned.
The ORTEX short score sits at 42.7, in the lower half of the 0-100 range, and has been drifting gently lower for two weeks. That is consistent with the broad trend: shorts are exiting, borrow conditions are loose, and the overall weight of evidence points toward reduced bearish conviction rather than any new pressure building. The one mild counterpoint is Tuesday's single-day jump in shares short — up 24% from Monday — but that sits against a backdrop of a 52% week-on-week decline, making it look more like noise within a clear downtrend.
What to watch is whether the ETF's recent weakness — down nearly 2% on the week despite a solid month up 5.3% — draws fresh short interest back into a now-liquid borrow market, or whether the positioning reset holds as the broader new-economy theme finds its footing.
See the live data behind this article on ORTEX.
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