[actually_a_dog]

Short interest on WDC isn't absurdly high, so, if that's the motivation, it's a pretty risky move to make not a lot of money.

https://www.nasdaq.com/market-activity/stocks/wdc/short-inte...

[Jarwain]

You don't need short interest to make money shorting the stock. Short interest is useful for trying to squeeze people shorting the stock.

To make money off shorting the stock, all you need is for the stock to drop in price

[gruez]

I think his point is that the short interest is low, therefore it's not that heavily shorted, so if the attacker was doing the hack and shorting the stock to make money on the dip, he wasn't shorting enough to make that much money. Either that, or the attacker didn't short the stock in the first place.

[weird-eye-issue]

That would be a silly point. Puts don't even show up in the short interest and are a great way to short a stock.

[gruez]

They do, indirectly because market makers hedge the puts they sell by shorting the underlying.

https://www.investopedia.com/terms/d/deltagamma-hedging.asp

[weird-eye-issue]

Not every put seller gamma hedges. And the extent to which they do depends on how ITM the option is.