On August 2, an investor holds 40,000 shares of an ABC stock in its portfolio. The market price is $70 per share. The investor is interested in reducing its portfolio beta to 0.5 over the next month and decides to use the September Mini S&P 500 futures contract. The index is currently 1,500 and one contract is for delivery of $50 times the index. The beta of the stock is 1.1. What strategy should the investor follow?

How many contracts would need to be Long or Short?