I'm always long something. So how's your short book been doing lately that you have been building for months now based on your macro analysis?
My shorts aren't based on "macro" analysis. CELG, TSO and MPEL are great - made some scratch off VLO, and I have high hopes for RSH (sh0orted today). My longs have done fine, for the most part, to. I'm not going to complain about my returns. Did you get my memo on JOYG 10 points ago? You aren't comfortable shorting specific stocks, are you? I understand.
Very few. I'm short a couple biotechs and little small cap tech, but some blew up in my face. I would say across the 10 or so I'm short I'm about break even with a little luck. But you're right, I prefer SPY/IWM puts or future shorts depending on the signals I get, just to protect long exposure. I admire people who can make consistent money shorting single stocks. It's one of the hardest games to play IMO.
The mathematics of shorting small caps are appalling - the kind of R:R that you would ignore with a long. They can easily spike up 20% on MM games and 40% is a realistic optimistic target with 100% the maximum. I don't look at longs with that kind of R:R.