(San Francisco)

Faangs and the tech sector more generally have had a tumultuous year. There have been a lot of fears over regulation, valuation, and data breaches. Yet, on the whole, the performance has been strong. However, many investors are now turning against the faangs in a big way, as short bets against it have soared recently. There is now a $37 bn short position against the group of companies, up 40% in the past year. Amazon is the most shorted single stock, with around $10 bn of short interest against it. Faangs have accounted for almost half of the Nasdaq’s rally above 8,000.

FINSUM: The short interest is understandable given the lofty valuations, but the issue is that the underlying businesses look quite strong, which makes us doubtful there is going to be a coordinated faang crash of any grave magnitude.