When this was written — On 21 October 2026. The figures are as at that date or earlier and have not been updated since.
The ASX's short book is wider than it was a quarter ago and sitting in different stocks. On 15 October, ASIC's daily aggregate report had 16 ordinary-share lines above 10% of shares on issue and 67 above 5%. R1 On 16 July the same report had 12 above 10% and 61 above 5%. R2 The average position across the roughly 700 securities with one at all is 1.57%, the median 0.39%: most of the exchange is barely shorted, and the growth is at the top.
The breadth changed too. In the week to 12 October, 188 stocks saw their position rise and 104 saw it fall, on Shorted's weekly report; in the week to 14 September the split was 154 to 142. The market the positions sit in is falling: the S&P/ASX 200 closed below its 200-day moving average on 20 October, the reading Shorted's stock picker treats as a downtrend regime.
This piece uses Shorted's ASIC-derived series throughout, in percentage points of shares on issue, and the economic series Shorted republishes from the Reserve Bank and the Bureau of Statistics. Every short figure is as at the position date; ASIC publishes four trading days later.
Half the top ten turned over
| 16 July | 15 October | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Lotus Resources (LOT) | 22.80% | DroneShield (DRO) | 16.40% |
| Domino's (DMP) | 13.85% | Lotus Resources (LOT) | 15.48% |
| DroneShield (DRO) | 12.87% | Boss Energy (BOE) | 14.68% |
| 4DMedical (4DX) | 12.66% | Zip Co (ZIP) | 13.59% |
| Flight Centre (FLT) | 12.44% | PLS Group (PLS) | 13.08% |
| Paladin (PDN) | 11.79% | IperionX (IPX) | 12.99% |
| Telix (TLX) | 11.70% | Paladin (PDN) | 12.09% |
| Boss Energy (BOE) | 11.68% | Domino's (DMP) | 11.89% |
| Car Group (CAR) | 11.57% | Lynas (LYC) | 11.73% |
| Elders (ELD) | 10.89% | WiseTech (WTC) | 11.08% |
Five names entered: Zip from 7.93%, PLS from 9.44%, IperionX from 9.39%, Lynas from 9.72% and WiseTech from 8.32%. R2 Five left: 4DMedical to 10.65%, Flight Centre to 10.31%, Telix to 11.06%, Car Group to 5.02% and Elders to 9.31%. R1 Lotus Resources lost the top spot despite an increase in reported shares short: its position rose from 62.3 million to 84.7 million shares, but the shares on issue doubled, from 273 million to 547 million, so the percentage fell 7.3 points. R1 R2 A percentage is two numbers; the counts tell the story the ratio hides.
Where the quarter's builds went
Lithium. PLS from 9.44% to 13.08%, Liontown from 2.67% to 8.01%, Core Lithium from 0.24% to 4.79%, Elevra from 3.47% to 6.62%. R1 R2 The prices fell between 13% and 52% over the same quarter. The lithium piece has the detail.
Rare earths and critical minerals. Lynas rose from 9.72% to 11.73% as its price fell from $15.96 to $11.35, a 29% drop; Kalkine reports the suspension of China's rare earth export controls is due to expire in November and the company's quarterly report is due later this month. 5 Arafura went from 1.30% to 6.03%, 79 million to 366 million shares, an eight-week run of weekly increases that continued through a binding offtake agreement announced on 11 October 4 and the ground-breaking at its Nolans project; the price went from $0.205 to $0.15. Lindian went from 0.10% to 6.00%, 1.8 million to 111 million shares, as its price fell from $0.72 to $0.415 and it told the market first concentrate at Kangankunde in Malawi is on track for December. 6 IperionX rose from 9.39% to 12.99% while its price fell from $3.23 to $1.96, a 39% drop, across a Nasdaq listing. 7
Defence. DroneShield from 12.87% to 16.40%, now the most shorted stock on the exchange, with the price down from $2.17 to $1.49; Electro Optic Systems from 4.73% on 1 July to 10.94%. Both have their own coverage.
Software. WiseTech from 8.32% to 11.08%, NextDC 8.35%, SiteMinder 8.20%. Software and services had the largest sector lift in the week to 12 October, +0.12 points on average across 32 stocks.
Uranium. Boss Energy from 11.68% to 14.68% with the price roughly flat, $1.275 to $1.285, after a round trip through $1.70 in late August. Paladin 11.79% to 12.09%. Deep Yellow 8.64% to 9.69%. The Boss position has its own piece.
Where the covering was
The exits were in services. Healius went from 10.33% to 2.16%; Car Group from 11.57% to 5.02%; Guzman y Gomez from 9.01% to 4.61%; Flight Centre from 12.44% to 10.31%; 4DMedical from 12.66% to 10.65%; Domino's from 13.85% to 11.89%; Treasury Wine from 10.56% to 9.90%; Endeavour from 9.70% to 8.46%. R1 R2 The last three are covered in the crowded exits piece: the positions shrank slowly while the prices rose 10% to 17% in a month, and the exits are 26 to 35 days of volume long.
By state, Shorted's operations-weighted estimate puts the short book heaviest where the miners are: companies with Western Australian operations carry an exposure-weighted short position of 2.91%, against 2.43% for New South Wales, 2.33% for Victoria and 2.26% for Queensland. That is an estimate of where listed companies operate, not an official statistic.
The backdrop
The Reserve Bank's cash rate target averaged 4.35% in August 2026, against 3.70% in August 2025, on the RBA series Shorted holds; the Bureau of Statistics' monthly consumer price indicator was running at 4.0% a year in August, from 3.2% a year earlier and a 4.6% peak in March. The seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was 4.65% in August, from 4.08% in January. Offshore, the 10-year US Treasury yield averaged 5.24% in October after 5.29% in September, a full point above its May level, and the Australian dollar was US$0.69 on 2 October, from US$0.72 in mid-September. All of these are on the economy pages, with their ABS and RBA sources.
None of that is a reason for any single position. It is the setting: a market under its long-term average, policy rates higher than a year ago and bond yields at their highest in the two decades of the series Shorted holds, into which short sellers added to commodity producers, growth software and defence while leaving the consumer names they had crowded into over the first half. Whether the October adds hold through the September-quarter reports due by the end of the month will be in the data by early November.
Method
Counts above 5% and 10% are ordinary-share lines in ASIC's daily aggregate report, excluding ETF units and debt securities. Risers and fallers are stocks whose position moved more than 0.01 percentage points week on week, from Shorted's weekly reports. Three-month comparisons are 16 July against 15 October, the latest position date published by 21 October. Prices are closes. Economic series are the ABS and RBA releases as Shorted holds them, downsampled; the cash rate figure is a monthly average of the target. Sector averages are simple means. Full series for every stock are on their pages, and the industry view aggregates every stock the feed reports.
Disclosure analysis, not a recommendation to buy or sell.