New York, NY—As of mid-December, short interest in 2,763 NASDAQ National Market^® securities totaled 4,536,740,426 shares compared with 4,390,393,621 shares in 2,759 National Market issues for the month of November.

The December short interest represents 2.87 days' average daily NASDAQ National Market share volume for the reporting period, compared with 2.52 days in November. Short interest in 677 securities on The NASDAQ SmallCap Market^SM totaled 176,267,129 shares for December, compared with 172,729,412 shares in 697 securities for the month of November. This represents 0.88 days average daily volume, compared with last month's figure of 1.11 days.

In summary, short interest in all 3,440 NASDAQ^® securities totaled 4,713,016,555 shares for December, compared with 3,456 issues and 4,390,393,621 shares in November. This is 2.65 days' average daily volume, compared with last month's average of 2.40 days.

The open short-interest positions reported for each NASDAQ security reflect the total number of shares sold short by all broker/dealers regardless of their exchange affiliations. A short sale is generally understood to mean the sale of a security that the seller does not own or any sale that is consummated by the delivery of a security borrowed by or for the account of the seller.

The monthly NASDAQ short-interest figures are current as of the 15th of the month and are released to the media after the market close on the seventh business day following that date. The figures this month include all short-interest positions reported November 17 through December 10 and settled as of December 15, 2003.

The total NASDAQ short positions for the preceding 13 months and current month follow:

For more information on NASDAQ Short-Interest positions, visit the  www.nasdaqtrader.com Web site