One should also factor in that there are lots of shares in very strong hands -- tens of millions between Mr. Ehrlich, Dr. Menon, and individual shareholders, some of whom have disclosed the size of their considerable holdings to me.

The number of shares that are available to be traded is much smaller than the float would indicate -- and that is actually quite small compared to a lot of biotechs.

So yes, a million shares legally short is a LOT of shares relative to how many actual trading shares are available to them when they are forced to cover.

They're not going to find it pleasant. I hope none of us are silly enough to let them off easy by selling shares cheaply when the first round of great news comes out.