REMX, VanEck's rare earth and strategic metals ETF, enters July with a sharply divided signal: shorts have retreated meaningfully from June highs, yet the fund itself has lost ground on the week — a divergence worth tracking closely.
The most telling shift is in the lending market. Availability has loosened considerably. At the mid-June trough on June 10, the borrow pool was near fully tapped — availability had collapsed to roughly 25%, the tightest reading of the past year. Since then, the picture has reversed. Availability now sits at 113%, meaning shares available to borrow comfortably exceed the current short position. Short interest itself has dropped sharply alongside: from around 1.76 million shares short in mid-June to just under 950,000 by June 30, a fall of roughly 46% from peak. At 4.6% of the free float, it remains a non-trivial positioning, but the direction of travel is firmly lower. Cost to borrow reflects the easier conditions — running near 1%, well below the 1.5–1.7% range that prevailed through late May and early June.
Options positioning has tilted modestly more defensive over the past two weeks, though not dramatically so. The put/call ratio moved up to around 0.65–0.68 through mid-to-late June before easing slightly to 0.65 by month end. That is above the 20-day average of 0.60, but only around 0.8 standard deviations above — not an extreme reading. The 52-week high on PCR was 0.68, so recent weeks represent the upper range of observed sentiment without breaking into genuinely alarmed territory. Options buyers are leaning defensively, but not rushing for the exits.
The price action adds context. REMX bounced 2.5% on June 30, but still closed the week down 3.6% at $88.50. The one-month loss stands at 11.2%, reversing a solid run that extended into late June. The ORTEX short score has drifted lower through the final week of June, falling from 52.6 on June 22 to 50.4 by June 30 — a midpoint reading suggesting neither a strong squeeze setup nor an aggressive bear thesis is dominant right now. Rare earth names are inherently sensitive to Chinese export policy and EV supply-chain narratives, and the recent price weakness follows a period when critical mineral tailwinds were widely flagged as a bullish catalyst.
The key dynamic to watch heading into July is whether availability continues to loosen or begins to tighten again. The June 10 squeeze — when nearly the entire lending pool was committed — unwound quickly as shorts covered. If macro headlines on Chinese rare earth restrictions or EV demand reassert themselves, watch whether short rebuilding resumes and whether availability drops back through the 50% threshold that marked the danger zone through the first half of the month.
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