Nexstar Media Group enters the week ahead of its August 6 earnings with a sharp internal contradiction: short sellers have been rebuilding positions aggressively, yet options traders are as bullish as they have been all year.
The short interest story has moved quickly. Estimated SI has climbed 45% over the past month to reach 7.1% of the free float — a level that warrants attention in a broadcaster trading at just $175. The sharpest step came mid-week: shares short jumped roughly 12% in a single session on July 9, lifting the figure to around 2.15 million shares. Cost to borrow has followed suit, rising 54% on the week to 0.73%, though in absolute terms it remains low. Critically, availability is not tight — lendable supply runs at 767% of short interest, comfortably within normal range, meaning new shorts face no meaningful friction in establishing positions. The lending market is open; the question is what's driving the demand to use it.
Options positioning sits in striking contrast to that short-building. The put/call ratio has dropped to 0.43, roughly 1.7 standard deviations below its 20-day average of 0.58 — the most call-heavy reading in recent weeks and well below the midpoint of the 52-week range. That skew reflects demand for upside exposure, not protection. The two signals — shorts building, options traders buying calls — are pulling in opposite directions, which itself tells a story: this is a stock where conviction is split and both sides are active.
The Street leans constructive, though with trimmed ambitions. Every analyst on record carries a buy or outperform rating. Wells Fargo cut its target from $290 to $253 in early May after Q1 earnings, and Citigroup upgraded to Buy in April while simultaneously lowering its target to $220 — a pattern suggesting the Street sees value at current prices but is recalibrating for a softer ad environment. Benchmark and Deutsche Bank also hold Buy-equivalents with targets ranging from $250 to $270. Against the current price of $175.56, the gap to consensus targets is wide, implying the Street sees meaningful upside even after months of target reductions. Valuation multiples support that framing: the stock trades at a PE of roughly 5.7x and an EV/EBITDA of 4.5x — well below typical media sector averages. The factor scores add nuance: the analyst recommendation differential ranks in the 98th percentile, while the short score rank sits in the 21st — pointing to an asset that is well-regarded by the Street but under meaningful short pressure.
The founder's fingerprints are also worth noting. Chairman and CEO Perry Sook purchased 12,235 shares on June 26 at $162.26, a transaction worth just under $2 million. He remains the second-largest reported holder with a 6.1% stake. That purchase came roughly $13 below the current price and more than $25 below the Wells Fargo target set the month prior. On the same day in June, a cluster of senior executives — including the CFO and CTO — sold smaller parcels at $170.81, all with low significance scores. The net insider position over 90 days is positive at approximately 22,250 shares. The CEO buy stands out as the one trade with real size and signal; the executive sells read as routine.
The last two earnings prints produced muted reactions: a 2.8% gain the day after Q1 results in May and a 0.4% move after Q4 in February. Both faded to near-flat over the following five sessions. Broadcast peers have fared worse on the week — SBGI fell 6.6% and SSP dropped 10.8%, while GTN lost 2.3%. Nexstar's own 2.2% weekly decline looks contained by comparison, suggesting relative resilience or simply a later unwind.
The setup heading into August 6 is one where the borrow market is open, the shorts are reloading, and the calls are being bought — a divided field that the next earnings print will likely force to resolution.
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