In this article, we take a look at 12 Takeover Rumors Targeted By Short Sellers.
Takeover chatter can lift a stock, but it does not force short sellers to leave. That tension sits at the center of this list. In recent months, reported takeover interest has surfaced around companies across sectors such as QIAGEN, PayPal, JetBlue, Brown-Forman, Revolution Medicines, and Commvault, showing that deal speculation is not confined to a single sector or type of buyer.
The reason shorts can stay involved anyway is simple. Rumors are not signed agreements, and even real talks can fail due to price, financing, regulatory issues, or board resistance. That matters in a market where the Federal Reserve kept its target range for the federal funds rate at 3.50% to 3.75% in March 2026, leaving capital meaningfully more expensive than it was during the zero-rate era.
That is why short interest can remain elevated even when takeover stories circulate. The market may be willing to price in optionality, while short sellers may be betting that the chatter fades, the premium proves unjustified, or a buyer walks away. The stocks in this article sit in that narrow space between M&A hope and persistent skepticism.
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Methodology
We focused on publicly traded companies that were the subject of reported takeover or sale speculation and had elevated short interest. To stay aligned with the theme of this article, we narrowed the list to stocks with a short percentage of float of at-least 8%, using the overlap between M&A chatter and persistent bearish positioning as the main screen. We then ranked these stocks on the short percentage of float. These stocks are also popular among Wall Street analysts and elite hedge funds. The data for a short percentage of float for most of the stocks is as of March 31, according to MarketBeat.
Why are we interested in the stocks that hedge funds pile into? The reason is simple: our research has shown that we can outperform the market by imitating the top stock picks of the best hedge funds. Our quarterly newsletter’s strategy selects 14 small-cap and large-cap stocks every quarter and has returned 498.7% since May 2014, beating its benchmark by 303 percentage points (see more details here).
12. Revolution Medicines, Inc. (NASDAQ:RVMD)
Short Percentage of Float: 8.47%
Revolution Medicines, Inc. (NASDAQ:RVMD) is one of the takeover rumors targeted by short sellers.
On April 13, Revolution Medicines priced an upsized $2.0 billion concurrent offering of common stock and convertible senior notes, just two days after reporting pivotal Phase 3 pancreatic cancer data for daraxonrasib. The raise followed a sharp revaluation of the stock after the trial showed a median overall survival of 13.2 months versus 6.7 months with chemotherapy in previously treated metastatic pancreatic cancer, with the company saying the data will support global regulatory filings. Reuters reported the readout sent the shares up about 40%, a move that helped explain why management chose to raise capital into strength.
That financing move also reinforces what made Revolution Medicines attractive in the first place. In January, Reuters reported Merck had held talks to buy the company in a deal valued at roughly $28 billion to $32 billion, before later reporting on January 25 that those talks had ended. Even without a deal, the sequence matters: a company with a late-stage asset that suddenly posts unusually strong survival data, draws large-cap buyer interest, and then successfully raises $2 billion is the kind of biotech that stays in takeover chatter.
Revolution Medicines, Inc. (NASDAQ:RVMD) is a late-stage oncology company developing targeted therapies for RAS-addicted cancers. Its pipeline includes daraxonrasib and other RAS-directed candidates across pancreatic cancer, lung cancer, and related solid tumors.
11. Organon & Co. (NYSE:OGN)
Short Percentage of Float: 8.67%
Organon & Co. (NYSE:OGN) is one of the takeover rumors targeted by short sellers.
On April 10, 2026, Organon shares surged after reports said Sun Pharmaceutical Industries was preparing a binding bid for the company, with the potential transaction valued at about $12 billion. The rumor mattered because it abruptly shifted attention away from Organon’s usual overhangs and toward what a buyer might see in its portfolio, cash generation, and carve-out value.
That repricing was sharp. Organon’s stock jumped roughly 28% to 29% during the session following the report, a reminder that even a rumor can reset the market’s view when a stock has been weighed down by debt and muted growth expectations. Organon ended 2025 with $8.64 billion in debt and guided for 2026 revenue of $6.125 billion to $6.325 billion, versus $6.43 billion reported for 2025.
What makes Organon interesting in that context is the business mix. The company operates across women’s health, biosimilars, and a large established medicines portfolio, giving it a collection of cash-generating assets that can look more attractive to an acquirer than to a market focused mainly on leverage and slower top-line growth.
Organon & Co. (NYSE:OGN) is a global healthcare company focused on women’s health, biosimilars, and established medicines. The company was spun out of Merck in 2021 and markets products across reproductive health, cardiovascular, dermatology, respiratory, autoimmune, and other therapeutic areas.
