Pizza gets whacked: DMP shorts jump +4.06% as uranium stays crowded

Movers Analysis

The risers tell you where the market wants pain. DMP: 5.08% → 9.14% (+4.06%). This is a straight shot at a turnaround narrative in a cost-of-living tape — delivery, discounting, and food input costs don’t need to be catastrophic to make guidance fragile. NCK: 2.27% → 5.20% (+2.93%). Big-ticket discretionary. When shorts build here, they’re leaning into the idea that rate fatigue shows up first in furniture and home spend. BOE: 12.66% → 15.38% (+2.72%). Uranium optimism is alive, but the short interest says the market is stress-testing who can actually ramp production cleanly. CTD: 5.22% → 7.89% (+2.68%). Corporate travel is cyclical and confidence-sensitive; a short build reads like a bet that growth normalises and expectations are too high. Background reading: https://investor.travelctm.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/2024-Annual-Report-web.pdf. SGR: 5.30% → 7.72% (+2.41%). This is the market pricing asymmetric risk — regulation and balance-sheet questions don’t need much oxygen to keep shorts interested. The fallers show where the easy money may already have been made. WEB: 6.21% → 2.25% (-3.95%). That’s an exit. When shorts clear out that fast, it’s usually because the catalyst has played out or the squeeze risk isn’t worth the borrow. MIN: 13.40% → 9.93% (-3.48%). Covering in a liquid, heavily watched miner tends to be deliberate. LOT: 8.29% → 5.18% (-3.10%). Even within uranium, there’s rotation — some names are being pressed while others are being de-risked. APX: 2.93% → 0.10% (-2.84%). Shorts basically walked away. AUB: 3.28% → 0.65% (-2.63%). Another sharp unwind that stands out in a month where the average short across 639 stocks was only 1.19% and the period average change was -0.02%.

Industry Trends

Two trades dominated the tape. 1) Lithium is still the market’s favourite punching bag, but it’s more selective now. PLS (19.22%), Liontown (LTR) at 10.15% (+0.12%), and MIN (9.93%, despite the big cover) keep the sector in the top tier. The crowd is sticking with the big, liquid expressions. 2) Uranium is crowded and two-sided. BOE (15.38%), PDN (14.64%), and DYL (9.86%) sit heavily shorted, while LOT saw meaningful covering. That mix screams disagreement: one camp is buying the nuclear build-out; the other is shorting the messy reality of mine ramp-ups. Outside resources, the consumer squeeze is showing up in positioning. DMP and NCK both saw sharp short builds, and SGR joined them — different business models, same pressure point: discretionary spend in a high-rate economy.