Shares of retailers and other consumer companies fell in highly volatile trading as GameStop and other heavily shorted retail stocks rebounded from Thursday's selloff.
Shares of other companies in day traders' sights also rose, with clothing chain Express rising by more than 25%. Markets are in the midst of "a classic short squeeze driven by the collective might of retail investors," said strategists at brokerage Barclays, in a note to clients.
"Although the short squeeze started with GameStop, it appears to be spreading to a wider range of stocks." As of Jan. 26, GameStop still had one of the largest quotients of short interest based on the dollar value of shares out on loan, according to research firm S3 Partners. Short sellers had already lost $5 billion on the videogame chain's shares so far in 2021, an amount that exceeded the entire market capitalization of the company at the end of 2020, according to the S3 analysts.
Write to Rob Curran at rob.curran@dowjones.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
01-29-21 1701ET
