AA: The Opening Pitch of Earnings Season

The company has rising revenue year-over-year of $21.01 billion last fiscal year compared to $18.44 billion in the previous year. The bottom line has rising earnings year-over-year of $254.00 million last fiscal year compared to $-1.15 billion in the previous year.

Short interest is high for such a relatively large company. In the last short interest report, 7.6% of the float was shorted. On June 15, the reported number of shares short was 17.4 million, the largest amount reported in the last year.

Short sellers are the smart money and when they start ramping up aggressiveness it pays to keep your eye on what they are doing. Alcoa hasn't moved the needle much since the depths of 2008-09. I consider it a failure to still trade under $9 a share. It's the same reason why I estimate earnings to come in lower than the mean estimate.

This article is commentary by an independent contributor, separate from TheStreet's regular news coverage.