SLV Short Position Update

Theodore Butler
December 19, 2011 - 8:02am

The latest short position report for stocks was released earlier in the week for positions held as of Nov 30. This was the report that I had speculated would show a decline in the short position of SLV, the big silver Exchange Traded Fund (ETF). Contrary to my expectations, the short position for SLV increased by more than 2.2 million shares to 25.2 million shares. This represents almost 25 million ounces of silver. http://www.shortsqueeze.com/?symbol=slv&submit=Short+Quote%99

I had originally speculated that the short position in SLV would be lower in this report because the price of silver had experienced a fairly significant decline of roughly 10% ($34 to $31) within the reporting period. Most often, similar to what occurs on the COMEX, short positions expand on price increases and decline on price sell-offs. This is at the heart of the silver manipulation. To illustrate that point, the headline number in the CFTC’s Commitment of Traders Reports (COTs), the total net commercial short position, declined by 5,500 contracts from Nov 15 to Nov 29. The total COMEX commercial net position reduction was the equivalent of 27.5 million ounces, representing a 21% reduction over the two weeks. The reduction in the COMEX commercial short position was ten times greater than was the increase in the SLV short position in equivalent silver ounces, just to keep this in proper perspective. To be sure, had the COMEX commercial short position increased during that silver price decline as did the SLV, then I would have really been surprised; but that didn’t happen. Overall, the commercials were able to rig lower prices and speculative long liquidation as is their custom.

Still, I find the increase in the short position of SLV to be odd. During the reporting period, the price of gold also declined as much as $100. In contrast to the increase in SLV, the short position in GLD, the big gold ETF declined by 30% in the period from 22 million shares held short to just more than 15 million shares. The much smaller gold ETF, IAU, run by BlackRock (which is also the sponsor of SLV) witnessed a decline in its short position of 75%. (You can verify the specific numbers in the above link by inserting the stock symbols). (more)