Founder’s Note: JC Parets here.
Quantitative Analyst Grant Hawkridge burns the midnight oil for us, so to speak, monitoring overnight price action from his perch in Melbourne.
Grant breaks it down like no one can, and he has a new scan to share with us today.
Here’s Grant…
By Grant Hawkridge
G’day everyone!
Most of you know me already. But if you’re new here, I’m Grant Hawkridge – the Aussie portion of TrendLabs and the numbers guy behind the scenes.
I live in Melbourne, Australia, and work as a quantitative analyst. I’ve spent almost two decades studying markets, building strategies, and managing money.
These days, I’m best known for turning mountains of data into clear, visual insights.
Charts are my thing – and, as fate would have it, that’s exactly how I crossed paths with JC.
It all started more than five years ago, while I was living in Europe and sharing my thoughts on the market on what was once called Twitter.
I didn’t know it then, but I had somehow adopted JC’s charting style without even realizing it.
One day, he noticed. A few DMs later, we were chatting markets like old mates.
And the rest, as they say, is history.
Now, I’m the in-house quant at TrendLabs.
I do the heavy lifting with the numbers and build tools that help us track the market with more clarity.
It’s not about flashy headlines – it’s about staying grounded in what the data tells us.
We Track Stocks, Not Speeches
At TrendLabs, we stick to what matters – and that’s price.
We don’t build strategies around economic headlines.
Why?
Because the economic calendar doesn’t pay us. The price of the stock does.
Inflation numbers, Fed speeches, job reports – they might move the market for a day. But they’re not signals. They’re noise!
Price is the final vote. It reflects everything – the data, the emotion, the positioning – all rolled into one.
That’s why our work starts and ends with price.
We track what stocks are doing, not what economists are saying.
That’s the core of our approach.
We let the market tell the story. Our job is to listen – through the charts, the trends, and the behavior of buyers and sellers.
That’s how we stay grounded. That’s how we stay on the right side of the trade.
Where Short Interest Is Surging
We’ve just rolled out a new screener at TrendLabs – and it’s built to catch something most investors miss.
Every two weeks, FINRA releases short interest data.
It’s a government-mandated report that tells us how much of each stock’s float is being shorted.
Most ignore it. We don’t.
Why?
Because we’re not just looking at the numbers. We’re looking for the biggest changes from one report to the next.
That’s where behavior shifts. That’s where opportunity hides.
But here’s what makes our screener different.
We’re not ranking by raw short interest.
We’re sorting by the total dollar value of short interest as a percentage of a company’s market cap.
In other words, this adjusts for size.
It lets us compare short activity in a $1 billion stock and a $100 billion stock on equal terms.
That way, we can see where short exposure is truly meaningful.
Here’s a sneak peek at the screener:
JC will be sharing more about how we use this in our process.
But, for now, keep an eye on these names – they’re moving for a reason.
Stay sharp,
Grant Hawkridge
Quantitative Analyst, TrendLabs