HUT heads into July with an unusual split: short sellers have been cutting positions aggressively while options traders are now the most call-heavy they've been in months — a setup that points to rebuilding confidence rather than the elevated anxiety that framed the stock earlier this year.
The most striking development this week is the sharp retreat in short interest. Shorts have fallen nearly 16% over the past week to 12.6% of the free float, and are down more than 18% over the past month — a meaningful unwind from a position that was running close to 16 million shares just a week ago. The borrow market corroborates the picture: cost to borrow is a mere 0.53%, and availability is running at roughly 950% of short interest, meaning there are nearly ten shares available to lend for every one currently borrowed. That kind of looseness in the lending pool is consistent with a stock where short pressure is easing, not building. The ORTEX short score of 52.2 sits in the middle of its recent range, having drifted down from a local high of 54.5 on June 22 — another sign that bearish conviction has softened.
Options positioning reinforces the bullish tilt. The put/call ratio has dropped to 0.54, more than two standard deviations below its 20-day average of 0.63 — making this the most call-skewed reading in recent months and sitting close to the lower end of the 52-week range (0.31–0.79). Traders are buying calls rather than hedging with puts, a shift that stands in contrast to the more defensive posture visible through much of May and early June when the PCR consistently ran in the 0.65–0.77 band.
The Street is broadly constructive, and recent analyst moves have reinforced that. BTIG raised its price target to $150 from $115 last week — the most aggressive recent move, taking the target 30% above current levels — while Jefferies initiated with a Buy and a $156 target in mid-May. The consensus mean target of roughly $127 implies modest upside from the $115 level, but targets cluster in the $124–$156 range, suggesting the Street sees the stock as fairly valued at best or materially undervalued at most optimistic. The bull case centres on long-duration infrastructure contracts with Google and Fluidstack, plus brownfield conversion optionality. Bears flag the dependency on Bitcoin mining, negative free cash flow, and a Q1 2026 earnings miss in the Power and Infrastructure segments. Valuation is stretched — EV/EBITDA near 121x, price-to-book above 12x — though those multiples have compressed meaningfully over the past 30 days.
The institutional picture adds nuance. Coatue Management remains the largest holder at 8.1% of shares, flat on its last reported period. Vanguard entities added over 9 million shares combined in the Q1 filing. Third Point opened a new position of 870,000 shares. That institutional accumulation through Q1 contrasts with insider selling: the CLO sold $1.25 million of stock on June 17, and director Joe Flinn sold a combined $4.5 million across June 11–12. Net 90-day insider flows are positive only because of zero-price award grants — cash selling from insiders has been consistent.
Earnings history gives the clearest reason for options traders to stay alert. The May 6 Q1 print sent the stock up 25.7% on the day and 34.5% over the following week. The June 11 secondary announcement added another 12.5% on the day. Next results are scheduled for August 5 — the gap is five weeks away, but given the magnitude of prior reactions, how Bitcoin pricing and infrastructure segment margins trend into that date will be the key variable to watch.
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