Invested: The Rule #1 Investing Podcast

“There’s nothing evil, per se, about selling things short. Short sellers—the situations in which there have been huge short interests very often—very often have been later revealed to be frauds or semi-frauds.” — Warren Buffett Short selling, or shorting, plays an important role in public markets as it improves prices, rational capital allocation, prevents bubbles, and shines a light on fraud.   If investors think a stock's price is dropping, they can short the stock. They borrow shares and sell them with hopes of buying them back at lower prices. However, stocks can theoretically keep rising, which could cause losses. So the investors that short the stock will either have to put more money up to secure their position or close their positions.   Essentially, short selling exposes which companies' stock prices are too high. In their search for overvalued firms, short-sellers can discover inconsistencies or other questionable practices before the entire market does. Short sellers can almost be regarded as the