MDT

Medtronic Short Interest Reached 139 Million Shares as Its MiniMed Share Swap Closed

Medtronic short interest reached 139.0 million shares at the October 15 settlement, 8.1 times the September 15 level, as its MiniMed share swap closed. FINRA published the figure on October 26. It is 7.3 times the highest reading from May to September, and it is the largest one-settlement addition among 7,260 tickers. Medtronic's own press releases explain the timing: holders tendered 23 percent of the company's shares into the MiniMed exchange offer, only a fraction was accepted, and the rest came back. Our read is that the build is tied to the exchange offer, but the data cannot say whether it is hedging by tendering holders, option dealers, arbitrage pairs or outright bets. ORTEX estimates the short more…