Why market wide delta shifts wont lead to short position covering.

Well, let's call this my thesis, my opus, the culmination of hundreds of hours of DD.  this will not be a happy document. It will not be what you want to hear, but it is 100% just stating the facts and then my interpretation of those facts.

So let us start with the overview: there are two ingredients needed for a person taking a short position to decide to cover and exit the position:

1. The SBFR becomes too high, and maintaining the position becomes fiscally untenable. 

2. Due to outside pressures and outlook of the play make it fiscally responsible for the position taker to leave the position and realize gains or cut losses.
   The issue that will be discussed here are the mechanics of number 1.
   In a traditional market, the bulk of the factors needed to cause this first situation are the combination of the following, (note: all are reasons but their individual weighting is of course on a per situation basis. That being said, it requires that all be functional in their proportions to work properly)

3. Outside pressures from a shift in Delta. This can be from a variety of sources, such as news and events, sentiment and derivatives.

4. Days to cover

5. Shares on loan vs shares available

6. The Short Borrow Fee Rate

7. Issues with margin and or leverage from market movements or Theta and Rho.
   All of these things are not equal in weighting, but if one is absent, then there is a good chance the position will not find itself moving far enough past the tipping point. And while the use Greek are unique to derivatives, the concept of these Greeks is equally applicable to the state of a short position.

Regardless, all things being equal, generally a combination of all 5 must be present for there to be a short squeeze.
Now when I refer to a short squeeze, I am referring to any situation  where the Dela has shifted and shorts are being upended from their positions.
So, what if I told you that Wall Street has systematically removed one of these from the equation? What if I told you that nothing in this paper has to do with FTDs, Naked shorts or any other common “Retail” buzz word?
What if I told you they have found the one thing that causes the whole thing to come to breakeven proposition and can grind the price discovery to an absolute halt?
What if I told you they have done away with the Short Borrow Fee Rate?

If you are still reading, I will state first my theory of what happened and then I will give you the facts, sourced directly from FINTEL. And for these examples we will use FINTEL as the authority having jurisdiction.

2021 was a banner yield for the market. It had unheard of rebounds and it seemed like Mega caps and ETFs were hitting ATH and 52WH every week. But very quietly the liquidity was leaving the small and mid-caps. Short positions of 10,20,30% became common. Then 2022 came and then the large and Megas began to pull back, then the market as whole is found itself transitioning from correction to possible recession. 
We will not discuss the individual movements, but I think that the profits were reaped from 2021. Primes and Large institutions were rebalancing and reinvesting at levels that captured the up to 50% of the liquidity missing from the market. While they were doing this, they did something very quietly that it appears nobody noticed.
While everyone was screaming ATS/OTC, Dark Pools, Naked Shorts and the SEC institutes reporting, the primes very quietly set the SBFR on almost every short position down to sub 1%. Yes, that is correct, you can borrow and short stocks with a 20% SI and a BBB bond rating for less than 1% APR. Lower even than the money offered by the FED on a 24 HR turn around in some cases. Yes, they did this in the face of 25-100 base point hikes and 40-year highs in inflation. For the most part, it is a struggle to find a SBFR above 10%.
That’s the theory, now the facts. These are the facts from FINTEL on 3/04/2022

I will use a variety of stocks from Value, Growth and ETFs to show the discrepancy in no particular order
TICKER        SBFR        SHARES ON LOAN       SI

1. NIO       0.25%           73,001,288         6.71%
2. BB       0.42%           34,956.153         6.29%
3. AMC       0.71%           104,191,455       20.27%
4. SPY      0.27%         BBIG IS ALSO #1 ON THE NADAQ THRESHOLD LIST
5. BBIG      8.86%           34,483,937        25.27%             6. DKNG      0.44%          43,545,432         11.6%
6. GGPI      1.99%           6,162,881           7.7%     
7.  SOFI    1.45%        101,248,456         15.83%
8. OPEN      0.35%          65,881,857         13.65%
9. BAC      0.25%         56,496,842           0.7%
10. GME      1.99%         11,943,772         18.94%
11. WYNN     0.28%         6,232,072          5.97%
12. AMD      0.29%          88,709,340          7.44%
13. PYPL     0.25%          9,751,620           1.7%
14. DOCU     0.25%           9,300,829          4.78%
15. PROG     7.08%          14,902,605          11.2%
16. XE LA     3.32%          24,785,120          7.53%
17. ALF     41.96%           283,268            3.48%

SO FAR ALF IS THE HIGHEST SBFR WITH ONLY 3.48% OF THE FLOAT ON LOAN

ANY       23.24%           5,671,050          10.19%
FCEL       0.50%           67,900,332          19.21%
TLRY       1.58%           63,015219            14.1%
WKHS       2.42%           43,973,818          31.27%
MARA       1.71%           20,337,012             21%
TSLA       0.25%           24,326,020           2.88%
RIVN       3.77%           34,770,624           7.22%

I think 25 random examples is more than enough. I can do this all day and it will not change the fact that for the most part, Prime Lenders have removed the SBFR from the most heavily shorted stocks.
Conclusion: no matter how many rules are passed, how current the reporting is, if the whole market become block chain, liquidity and margin requirements, as long as funds can borrow shares at sub-prime rates, nothing in this market will ever be square. With this level of manipulation there will never be an end to the current situation and the market will never have open price discovery.
Thank you.
as a note: back in May, when AMC first started the journey to over $20, the SBFR was between 17-20% with an annual cost $275M. At its current 0.71% and price point, it costs less than $20M a year.