But how to short these is the million dollar question. Between punishing short borrow rates, collateral requirements, and just complete inability to find the stock to borrow in order to short I've found it very hard to do in practice. Would love to hear tips from anyone who's had success in this area.I don't trade penny stocks (but I did dabble there a bit prior to the dot com bust).
As far as I can see, the only real edge in penny stocks is trend following on the down side. Go short when strong downward momentum has been established. This usually ends up being a one way street with low odds of recovery. Of course, the odd penny stock could see an upward spike which is why you'd want to spread your money across a basket of 20 or so shorts at any given time.