Skewed U.S. Common Stocks: August 30, 2024

Skewness is the asymmetry of a frequency distribution of a random variance about its mean. It is a stock price change frequency distribution chart that is asymmetric, with a tail on one side of the mean, and more 'close in' observations on the other side.

Today, we see aggressive skew readings in the market now.

​A normal distribution is a symmetrical distribution around a mean change, and has a skewness value of zero. We set a positive and negative skewness limit that identifies just a few of the stocks with the largest degree of stock price skewness (see below for current limit).

We identify US-listed common stocks with a significant positive skew or a significant negative skew to their daily price changes. We think of this as more changes in one direction (vs. the mean change) offset by fewer but larger changes in the other direction. 

Positive Skew
A positive skew stock means there are more daily price changes that are worse than the average (or mean) change, offset by larger and less frequent changes that are better than the average.

Here is a theoretical example of a company with a positively skewed stock price:
- we have a stock that did not change in price over the past year (mean change = zero).
- all year the stock tended to drop, lots of red or negative days, terrible publicity, short sellers targeted the stock all year
- the stock had a short squeeze, or sharp reversal, and it drove the price of the stock back up

Another example (theoretical) of a company with a positively skewed stock price:
- there is a stock with deteriorating financial conditions, so the stock continually is priced lower and drops
- they discover and announce an innovation or new product that excites the market, and so new investment rushes in
- by the end of the year, the stock is back where it started

Negative Skew
A company with a negatively skewed stock price has more frequent days where the stock price does better than the mean, offset by fewer, larger price changes that are worse than the mean change. A negative skewed stock's frequency distribution (or bell-shaped curve) tends to lean forward, or towards gains, but is anchored with a longer tail of losses.

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List of Excessively Positive and Negative Skew Stocks

We found these positive skewness stocks today, ticker and skewness, with a lower skewness limit of six (6.0):
TICKER, SKEWNESS (descending order above limit)
LENZ    13.012
TPST    12.254
GRYP    11.596
HA      11.329
LBPH    11.064
GYRE    10.709
INSM    10.700
MTTR    10.560
JANX    9.232
CHUY    9.101
ITI     8.759
JNPR    8.512
IMVT    8.408
GAN     8.346
CGEN    8.188
PRFT    8.006
VERB    7.346
SMMT    6.995
PETQ    6.497

We found these negative skewness stocks today, with a skewness limit of negative six (-6.0):
TICKER, SKEWNESS (descending order above limit)
HLVX    -14.216
AVTE    -14.089
ACRS    -13.124
MRNS    -12.673
AMLX    -12.385
OVID    -12.096
GL      -11.806
IZM     -11.759
GLYC    -11.074
ALVR    -10.348
ALTO    -10.282
MGNX    -10.258
SSRM    -10.063
DRRX    -9.862
VSTM    -9.310
AKRO    -9.284
PAYC    -9.247
PCRX    -8.817
RAPT    -8.633
EW      -8.258
EVC     -8.220
ATRA    -8.105
VTYX    -8.096
OTLK    -8.064
WOW     -7.945
DV      -7.912
ETWO    -7.791
TMCI    -7.736
TDUP    -7.688
DXCM    -7.628
SPRY    -7.591
ODP     -7.555
ADM     -7.522
B       -7.414
IAS     -7.317
CXM     -7.178
VYX     -7.135
AADI    -6.815
SILK    -6.673
IRON    -6.492
PERI    -6.482
DG      -6.474
ALDX    -6.388
DBX     -6.372
LW      -6.310
WCC     -6.278
SPT     -6.239
SGH     -6.193
ABEO    -6.086
OM      -6.061
SKIN    -6.047

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Here is a short video we made in 2022 about skewness and the data we provide.

Contact us to learn more. You may purchase a sample CQNS report for $5.00, or a recent, full CQNS report for $50.00.