Traders betting against restaurants are getting clobbered (CMG, SBUX, MCD, DRI, CBRL, DPZ, YUM, DNKN, CAKE, SHAK)

pulse

June 22, 2017 7:31 PM

The restaurant sector has not been kind to short sellers this year.

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It was forecast to be a tough year for chain restaurants.

Cheaper groceries and more expensive food at restaurants slowed restaurant sales in 2016. Restaurants were also faced with rising pressure to raise their workers' wages.

But traders who bet against some of the industry's big names are mostly counting losses.

Year-to-date, Chipotle's shares have gained 11%, a performance that's not dissimilar to other restaurant chains that Wall Street is betting against. Starbucks, with almost $1.6 billion in short interest — ranking second — is up 7%, while McDonald's has soared 27%.

The table below shows the most shorted restaurant stocks, and the losses that short sellers have incurred year-to-date:

And the chart below shows that most of the most shorted restaurant stocks have traded the other way:

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