Potash, Samsung, Apple Inc. (AAPL) Attract Short Interest

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Alan Fouriner’s Pennant Capital is betting against Sky Deutschland AG (ETR:SKYD) (FRA:SKYD), a German television network company. Sky Deutschland is set to announce Q2 earnings today. Sky Deutschland AG (ETR:SKYD) (FRA:SKYD) has been a longstanding bullish position of Odey Asset Management, the company is the largest holding of Odey’s flaship fund Odey European.

Potash, Samsung, Apple Inc. (AAPL) Attract Short Interest

Sky Deutschland is the leading network porvider in Germany and Austria with 3.5 million subscribers. The company reported a 15% increase in revenues to 375.4 million euros against revenue of 326.7 million euros in the year ago quarter.  The main driver of the increase in sales was subscription revenues. EBITDA was up 60% increase at 36.8 million euros against 23.0 million euros in the prior year.

Shorts rising in Apple and Samsung chipmaker

Credit focused fund BlueCrest Capital disclosed a short position in Imagination Technologies Group plc (LON:IMG), a media and communications company. The London based company has lost 37% of its stock value over the year so far. BlueCrest has a 0.6% short in Imagination Tech’s outstanding shares. Imagination Technologies Group plc (LON:IMG) and rival ARM Holdings plc (NASDAQ:ARMH) provide processor chips to Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL)’s iPhones and iPads. Towards the end of July Samsung announced that it will use ARM Holdings plc (NASDAQ:ARMH)’s 3D processer in its latest Exynos 5 Octa processor, giving a blow to Imagination Technologies Group plc (LON:IMG) which had previously manufactured the same graphics processors used in Samsung smartphones.

Other funds who established shorts in Imagination after the Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. (LON:BC94) (KRX:005930)       news are JPMorgan Asset Management and Oxford Asset Management.

Ennismore Fund Management has taken a 0.57% short position in Acotel Group SpA (BIT:ACO), a microcap communication company based in Italy. Acotel has reported net loss in the 1H2013 and 2H2012.  Shares are down 12% YTD.

More shorts in potash miner KS AG

The potash cartel breakup has also induced Pennant Capital and  John Griffin’s Blue Ridge Capital into jumping in on the shorting bandwagon. Blue Ridge has a 0.8% short position as of Aug 2 whereas Pennant disclosed a 1.32% position. Total short interest in K S AG (ETR:SDF) (FRA:SDF) is now peaking at 13%, up from 9.6% on July 30. K S AG (ETR:SDF) (FRA:SDF), which is Europe’s largest potash miner, announced today that it will go on schedule on its mining project in Canada, saying that the company knows how to handle price shakeups. Once potash becomes freely traded, the commodity’s price is set to plummet and supply is very likely to exceed demand. K S AG (ETR:SDF) (FRA:SDF) has plunged 32% since the news broke.

KS AG reported 26 percent drop in earnings before to 162.6 million euros or $216.4 million in 2Q2013, missing analyst estimates of 175 million euros. Sales fell 12 percent to 874.5 million euros, compared with a 918.3 million euro estimate. The company also abandoned its FY2013 earnings forecast after this development.

It  has been previously predicted that the agricultural boom in Brazil will change the dynamics of the agri-industry. If this works out, Brazil will become the biggest importer of potash until 2020, thus compensating for reduced demand from countries like India and China.

Follow Tabinda Hussain @tabihussain

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