Materials Select Sector SPDR Fund (NYSEARCA:XLB) Short Interest Update

Materials Select Sector SPDR Fund (NYSEARCA:XLB) saw a large drop in short interest during the month of April. As of April 15th, there was short interest totaling 14,045,172 shares, a drop of 26.5% from the March 31st total of 19,117,831 shares. Based on an average daily trading volume, of 11,922,208 shares, the short-interest ratio is presently 1.2 days. Approximately 9.5% of the shares of the company are short sold.

Institutional Trading of Materials Select Sector SPDR Fund

Several hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in XLB. Morgan Stanley lifted its holdings in shares of Materials Select Sector SPDR Fund by 112.6% in the 4th quarter. Morgan Stanley now owns 7,499,014 shares of the exchange traded fund’s stock worth $340,080,000 after purchasing an additional 3,972,016 shares during the last quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Materials Select Sector SPDR Fund by 99.7% in the 4th quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 5,210,960 shares of the exchange traded fund’s stock worth $236,317,000 after purchasing an additional 2,601,880 shares during the last quarter. Main Management ETF Advisors LLC bought a new stake in shares of Materials Select Sector SPDR Fund in the 4th quarter worth approximately $72,742,000. Wells Fargo & Company MN lifted its holdings in shares of Materials Select Sector SPDR Fund by 97.4% in the 4th quarter. Wells Fargo & Company MN now owns 2,407,870 shares of the exchange traded fund’s stock worth $109,197,000 after purchasing an additional 1,188,168 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Quantitative Investment Management LLC bought a new stake in shares of Materials Select Sector SPDR Fund in the 4th quarter worth approximately $51,093,000. Institutional investors own 75.78% of the company’s stock.

Materials Select Sector SPDR Fund Stock Down 0.9%

NYSEARCA:XLB traded down $0.44 during trading hours on Wednesday, reaching $50.96. 7,046,262 shares of the stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 16,269,632. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $50.85 and a 200-day simple moving average of $47.90. Materials Select Sector SPDR Fund has a 52 week low of $41.02 and a 52 week high of $54.14. The stock has a market capitalization of $7.28 billion, a P/E ratio of 24.55 and a beta of 0.99.

Materials Select Sector SPDR Fund Company Profile

Materials Select Sector SPDR Fund (the Fund) seeks to provide investment results that correspond generally to the price and yield performance of the Materials Select Sector Index (the Index). The Index includes companies involved in such industries as chemicals; metals and mining; paper and forest products; containers and packaging, and construction materials. The Fund’s investment advisor is SSgA Funds Management, Inc