NANR, the State Street SPDR S&P North American Natural Resources ETF, enters the second week of July with a notable shift in its lending dynamics — shorts have retreated sharply while borrow conditions have loosened considerably from levels that were extremely tight just weeks ago.
The most striking feature of this week's data is how dramatically the lending picture has reversed. Back in early-to-mid June, availability had dropped to just 5.6% — meaning fewer than one share was available for every seventeen already borrowed, a genuinely stressed borrow market. That tightness has since collapsed. Availability is now back above 259%, with more than 57,000 shares available in the lending pool, nearly five times the level of two weeks ago. Cost to borrow has also eased, falling roughly 16% on the week to 2.47% — down from a peak of around 4.8% hit in late May. The borrow market has gone from pinched to comfortable in a matter of trading sessions.
Short interest itself tells the same story of retreat. The estimated short position fell by 63% in a single session on July 7, and is down 67% across the week to just 0.16% of free float — a level so low it barely registers as a directional bet. That said, the one-month picture is messier: short interest is up more than 320% versus 30 days ago, which tells you most of the June build-up has now been unwound rather than extended. The ORTEX short score has drifted lower too, from 48 on June 24 to 41.4 now, moving toward the less-pressured end of the range.
The price action is broadly consistent with the short unwind. NANR closed at $76.17, up 0.9% on the week and up 0.17% on Tuesday. The one-month return is still slightly negative at -4.5%, which maps to the period when borrow was tightest and short positioning was most elevated. Since borrow conditions loosened in late June, the fund has stabilised. Options add little to the story — the put/call ratio has sat at zero throughout the past 30 days, with the 52-week high only reaching 0.06, suggesting essentially no options-based hedging activity on this name. As an ETF, that is not unusual, but it does mean there is no options signal to interpret.
The dividend history shows a $0.71 per share cash distribution announced earlier in January for a June 2026 pay date, consistent with the fund's twice-yearly pattern. Valuation multiples are not meaningful for an index ETF of this structure.
What to watch next is whether the remaining short interest — now at its lowest level in the 30-day window — holds or rebuilds. The June episode showed how quickly positioning can shift in a natural resources fund when commodity sentiment moves; the speed of both the build and the unwind over the past six weeks is the defining feature of this week's note.
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