BREAKING: Short interest in the Russell 2000 index is up to 8.0% of shares outstanding, the highest since at least 2019. Since the start of 2025, this percentage has nearly doubled. By comparison, before the 2022 bear market, short interest in small-cap stocks was ~3.5%. This comes after the S&P 500 outperformed the Russell 2000 in Q3 2026 by 9.6 percentage points, its largest outperformance since Q1 2020. Meanwhile, short interest in the S&P 500 ETF, SPY, stands at ~9.0% of shares outstanding, below the 10.0% average seen in 2024-2025 and far below the 15.0% average between 2020 and 2023. Are small caps set for a short squeeze?