BX heads into its July 17 earnings report on the back of a strong week — up 7.5% to $122.78 — while options positioning quietly turns less cautious than it has been in months.
The most revealing signal this week is in the options market, where put demand has eased well below its recent norm. The put/call ratio dropped to 1.41, nearly two standard deviations below its 20-day average of 1.50 — the least defensive reading in close to a year, compared with a 52-week high of 1.87. That's a notable rotation: for much of June, PCR had been running persistently above 1.50, reflecting ongoing caution. The shift into this earnings window suggests hedging appetite has unwound sharply alongside the price recovery.
The lending market reinforces that picture. Short interest has fallen 12% over the week to 2.5% of the free float — a level that is simply not interesting from a squeeze or pressure standpoint. Borrowing costs sit at 0.48%, essentially unchanged on the week and among the cheapest in Blackstone's peer group. Availability is exceptionally loose at over 2,000% of current short interest, meaning roughly twenty shares remain available to borrow for every one already shorted. The ORTEX short score has drifted down steadily all week, from 36.1 to 35.3, and ranks in the 47th percentile of the universe — squarely in the middle, with no directional signal worth reading into. Overall, positioning looks complacent rather than crowded.
The Street's take is a study in divergence on targets, but consistent on direction. Bulls point to Blackstone's $1 trillion AUM milestone, forward EPS growth running well above 200% year-on-year, and a diversified platform across real estate, infrastructure, and private credit. The most optimistic targets on file — from Citizens and Morgan Stanley — sit in the $184–$190 range, though those were set in April and have not been refreshed. More recent analyst action, from TD Cowen in May, kept a Buy rating while trimming the target to $133, a level the stock is now trading through. JPMorgan and Piper Sandler remain Neutral with targets of $130–$136. The consensus mean sits at $143.30, implying around 17% upside from current levels, though with the stock at $122.78 and several targets below that or just marginally above it, the Street's conviction is uneven. Factor scores tell a cleaner story on dividend strength (93rd percentile) and 30-day EPS momentum (77th percentile), while EPS surprise history (34th percentile) and days-to-cover rank (33rd percentile) are more muted. The 30-day EPS estimate momentum reading is the single most constructive quantitative signal heading into the print.
The earnings history is worth noting plainly. The last two prints both produced first-day declines: the April 2026 result sent the stock down 6.2%, with the loss extending to 3.2% over the following five days. The January 2026 print fell 3.0% on the day and then a further 10.6% over the week that followed. Neither reaction was catastrophic, but the pattern is consistent — BX has sold off on results even in a quarter where the AUM milestone landed. Peers had a solid week: OWL led the alternative manager group with a 6.6% gain, while ARES and TPG each added around 3.9% and 3.5% respectively. KKR was the laggard of the group, up just 1.3% — leaving BX's 7.5% advance as one of the stronger performances in the cohort.
The July 17 print is therefore less about whether Blackstone can sustain its AUM trajectory and more about whether fee-related earnings and distributable income land above a Street consensus that remains split between cautious neutrals and bullish outliers — with the recent habit of post-result selling fresh in the market's memory.
See the live data behind this article on ORTEX.
Open BX on ORTEX →ORTEX Market Intelligence content is generated by AI from a snapshot of ORTEX's proprietary data. Content is informational only and does not constitute investment advice.
