What is short interest, and where does FINRA publish it?

What does FINRA publish?

On its Equity Short Interest Data page, FINRA says it publishes the short interest reports it collects from broker-dealers for all exchange-listed and over-the-counter (OTC) equity securities. The page says the data is available online for one rolling year based on the settlement date given in FINRA's short interest reporting deadlines, with archived data available by download. The companion files page lists downloadable files and states that archive files go back to 2014. It also says that before June 2021 the data covered OTC securities only and did not reflect short interest in exchange-listed securities. When we opened the page on 10 October 2026, the file listed was dated 15 September 2026.

FINRA describes the purpose as helping investors gauge the market sentiment surrounding a security or exchange.

What does the rule require firms to report?

FINRA Rule 4560 governs the reports. Member firms must record and report gross short positions existing in each individual firm or customer account, including broker-dealer accounts, that resulted from a short sale as defined in Rule 200(a) of SEC Regulation SHO, or from a transaction marked long under Regulation SHO in the circumstances the rule describes. Reports must be received by FINRA no later than the second business day after the reporting settlement date designated by FINRA.

The rule also limits what counts: members report only short positions from short sales that have settled, or reached settlement date, by the close of the reporting settlement date. And it exempts, for example, a sale by a person who owns the security and intends to deliver it as soon as possible without undue inconvenience or expense.

How is this different from what a 13F shows?

The two are easy to confuse. A Form 13F is filed by large managers and lists long positions only; the SEC's questions and answers say short positions should not be included and should not be netted against long positions (see what a 13F leaves out). Short interest comes from broker-dealers and counts short positions in a security. So a 13F cannot tell you who is short a stock, and short interest cannot tell you which managers hold it long. They are different filings from different filers.

When is it published?

FINRA's pages tie the data to a settlement date and to a published calendar of reporting deadlines, and firms report within two business days after that date. We did not open that calendar, so this article does not give publication dates. FINRA's data page is the place to check the date of the latest file and the calendar for the next one. OQRO's company pages include short selling data; the measured freshness of each source is on the status page.

What is a settlement date?

In the rule, the reporting settlement date is a date designated by FINRA at which positions are measured. The rule counts only short positions from short sales that have settled by that date, so the figure is a count as of one date, published afterwards. It is not a running tally.

How should a reader handle a number?

Treat it as what the rule says it is: short positions reported by member firms, per account, counted as of a settlement date that FINRA designates, and published afterwards. Compare a figure with the previous date's figure for the same security rather than with a different security's, because the pool of broker-dealer accounts and the reporting date differ. Note that FINRA's own page says data before June 2021 covered over-the-counter securities only, so comparisons across that date are not like for like for exchange-listed names.

The data is gross by account. It does not net a firm's long and short positions in the same security, so it is a count of short positions reported, not a measure of anyone's net exposure.

Dates to keep apart

Three dates matter. The first is the settlement date that FINRA designates for a report. The second is the deadline for firms, which Rule 4560 puts at the second business day after that date. The third is the date FINRA posts the data, which its pages show; when we opened the files page, the newest file listed was dated 15 September 2026. A reader who sees a short interest figure should note which settlement date it refers to, because the same security will have a different figure at the next date. FINRA's data page also says the online view covers a rolling year, so older figures come from the archive files instead.

What this does not tell you

Short interest is a count of reported short positions in a security. It does not say who holds them, why they were opened, or whether they are hedges against other holdings. Many reasons for shorting exist, and a figure cannot separate them. It is also reported at settlement dates, so it is out of date by the time it appears, and positions can change between reports. A high or low count is not a prediction of the price, and OQRO does not present it as one.

To see how this sits beside other disclosures for one company, the institutions page and the company pages put 13F holdings, insider trades and other filings in one place, each linked to its official record.