Short sellers piled into AMBO overnight. Cost to borrow jumped from under 5% to 73.9% in a single week — a 1,450% move — while short interest rocketed from roughly 4,000 shares to 116,264.
The numbers tell a dramatic story. Short interest sat at just ~4,000 shares for most of April and early May. On May 12, it surged to 116,264 shares — a 2,788% weekly increase. That pushed the SI reading to 4.07% of free float, up from a negligible 0.15%.
The borrow market responded immediately. Cost to borrow had been anchored between 3.3% and 5.4% for nearly two months. It jumped to 73.9% on May 12. Availability has tightened sharply alongside — the lending pool is now under severe strain, with only roughly 4 shares available per 100 already borrowed.
Timing matters here. AMBO has an earnings event confirmed for May 19. That is six days away.
The short interest history shows a pattern of modest activity around prior earnings dates. The April 24 event triggered a 6.6% one-day move. The April 2 event produced a 10.6% five-day swing. The current short build is orders of magnitude larger than anything seen around those events.
The borrow cost at 73.9% means holding a short position is expensive by the day. Borrowers paying that rate into a scheduled earnings release are making a high-conviction bet.
Prior to this week, borrow cost never exceeded 7.1% in the trailing two months. The jump to 73.9% is not a drift — it is a structural repricing. That level of cost-to-borrow typically reflects either a sudden shortage of lendable shares, aggressive new demand for borrows, or both.
The utilization data reinforces this. As of May 12, utilization sat at 95.86% — matching its 52-week high. A week earlier it was 34.79%. The entire available lending pool has been consumed in days.
Data summary:
See the live data behind this article on ORTEX.
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