CHWY Brushes Off Bull Note, Continues Downtrend

CHWY has struggled on the charts over the past six months

Online pet food supplier Chewy Inc (NYSE:CHWY) is pointed lower this morning, last seen down 1% at $28.20 before the bell despite a fresh analyst bull note. Wedbush upgraded the equity to "outperform" from "neutral" and hiked its price target to $35 from $30. The revised price target represents a 23% upside to Friday's close of $28.47, and is right on par with the equity's average 12-month price target of $35.91. Even further, coming into today just over half of following brokerages sport a "strong buy" or "buy" recommendation.

CHWY has been uninspiring on the charts long term. In fact, since mid-January, the shares have begun a trend to the downside, and last Thursday breached the brief support of its 30-day moving average. Over the past six months, the pet stock has shed 16%.

Despite a recent exodus, short sellers remain in control. Short interest on Chewy stockdropped more than 18% during the most recent reporting period, but still accounts for 29% of the equity's total available float. In other terms, this would take short sellers more than five days to buy back their bearish bets, at CHWY's average pace of daily trading.