Top Nasdaq Short-Squeeze Plays

Updated from 8:45 a.m. EDT

On July 15, the Securities and Exchange Commission issued an emergency order to enhance investor protections against "naked" short-selling in the securities of Fannie Mae(FNM Quote), Freddie Mac(FRE Quote) and primary dealers at commercial and investment banks. If the SEC continues crackdowns on selling short without borrowing the securities, this may create some interesting short-squeeze opportunities.

A short squeeze takes place when a stock's short-sellers cover their positions quickly when good news boosts the price of the stock. This short-covering often drives the stock price even higher. The metric for measuring short-squeeze plays is the short ratio, which represents the number of days it would take a stock's short-sellers to cover their position based on the stock's recent average daily volume.

With this in mind, at Stockpickr.com, we've compiled a list of the top Nasdaq short-squeeze plays for July, including Portfolio Recovery Associates(PRAA Quote) and CoStar Group(CSGP Quote).

For the rest of the story, and to find out which Nasdaq stocks present possible short-squeeze opportunities, please click here.

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A note from James Altucher:

Every weekend I send an email to Jim Cramer and several hedge fund managers about the most interesting portfolios posted on Stockpickr that week. Usually those portfolios not only list stocks according to a theme but also offer significant analysis as to why the stocks are cheap.

Here are some examples:

• Stocks related to drilling the Marcellus Shale

• MLPS with yields above 7%

• Microcaps trading for less than tangible book

• Stocks that do well after Hurricanes

Here's the challenge: Build a portfolio at Stockpickr.com with great analysis, and send me the link. Each great portfolio (with analysis) will get posted on TheStreet.com with your byline (as a "Stockpickr Guest Columnist") and will be included in my email I send to Jim and the other hedge fund managers on my list.