Bets against Beyond Meat have made the plant-based food company the most shorted stock on the Russell 1000 Index

• About 37% of Beyond Meat's available shares are shorted, new data shows.
• That makes the plant-based food maker the most heavily shorted company on the Russell 1000 Index.
• Short sellers made $735 million in 2021 betting against Beyond Meat as the stock sank.

Bearish bets against Beyond Meat stock are piling up, with famed short-seller Jim Chanos also reportedly joining in.

According to the latest data from financial analytics firm S3 Partners, short interest in the plant-based food company is now about 37% of available shares, or $1.38 billion. That up from 26% in early October, and it means Beyond Meat is the most shorted company on the Russell 1000 Index, according to Bloomberg.

Betting against the company was a profitable position last year, considering short sellers made $735 million in profits, Ihor Dusaniwsky of S3 Partners told Insider in an email. In the new year though, short sellers so far have lost $126 million as Beyond Meat stock has rallied 10%.

Now Chanos, the short seller best known for predicting Enron's collapse, is betting against Beyond Meat because he said it's stopped being a growth company, he told The Financial Times. His firm, Kynikos Associates, did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.

In 2019, Beyond Meat became the first plant-based meat startup to go public, and it had an explosive IPO. Last year, the meat-alternative company briefly became a meme stock as it rallied alongside other popular retail-trader names like AMC and GameStop.

But while shares have risen so far in 2022, the stock price has lost about 43% of its value in the last 12 months. Meanwhile, the Russell 1000 Index, which includes the top 1,000 US companies by market value, rose 20% over the same time period.

Beyond Meat stock sank 20% in November after posting a wider-than-expected loss for the third quarter and issuing a weak sales outlook. The company predicted continued labor problems and caution among customers amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Beyond Meat did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment for the story.