KUALA LUMPUR (Feb 3): Investors pulled the brakes on short selling of Top Glove Corp Bhd on Tuesday (Feb 2) after days of a social media-driven retail frenzy.

According to data provided by Bursa Malaysia on regulated short selling (RSS), investors did not make any RSS transactions on Top Glove yesterday. Incidentally, they did not engage in any RSS on any other glove counters, save for Hartalega Holdings Bhd and Comfort Gloves Bhd.

In the case of Comfort Gloves, it saw 343,100 shares worth RM1.08 million shares shorted. Meanwhile, Hartalega saw 16,700 shares worth RM221,422 shorted.

It is worth noting that Top Glove has been the subject of RSS by investors.

On the final two trading days of last week, Top Glove shares were the second most shorted on Bursa after Public Bank Bhd.

Last Friday (Jan 29), Top Glove saw 2.52 million of its shares worth RM16.69 million shorted. Last Wednesday, 2.44 million shares worth RM15.16 million were shorted.

Just last week alone, Top Glove saw 17.25 million shares worth RM110.25 million shorted.

As for Hartalega, 1.16 million shares worth RM14.62 million shares were shorted by investors. Meanwhile, Supermax Corp Bhd saw 1.39 million shares worth RM9.29 million shares shorted. Kossan Rubber Industries Bhd did not see any of its shares shorted last trading week.

As of Jan 29, three of the big four rubber glove companies had occupied the podium finishes on Bursa’s Net Short Selling List.

The percentage of the net short position of Top Glove stood at 2.95% or 241.9 million shares. It is worth noting that the percentage had increased from Jan 27, during which it registered 2.92% or 239.45 million shares.

Meanwhile, Kossan's was at 2.18% or 55.61 million shares, and Hartalega's was at 1.39% or 47.33 million shares. As for Supermax, it was at 0.61% or 16.52 million shares.

The shorting of rubber glove stocks, particularly Top Glove, has been in headlines of late after social media forums such as BursaBets highlighted these stocks for short selling in order to emulate the shorting squeezing on US video game retailer GameStop.

RSS was suspended by Bursa in March 2020 amid the global equity rout in order to address market volatility at the time. It was reinstated on Jan 1.