SoFi Technologies has clawed back to $18.55 this week — up 4.5% — with short sellers quietly trimming exposure and Goldman Sachs lifting its target just days ago, setting up an interesting pre-earnings dynamic ahead of the July 27 print.
The short interest picture has shifted modestly since last week's note. Bears still hold 186.8 million shares short — 15.5% of the free float — but that is down 2.5% on the week, a reversal from the steady monthly build flagged in the previous piece. The ORTEX short score has edged lower to 63.2 from 65.9 a week ago, still elevated but no longer pressing its recent highs. Crucially, the borrow market remains accommodative: availability has loosened further to 172%, up from 166% last week and well above the 52-week floor of 80% hit in early June. Cost to borrow is running at just 0.45%, down 13% on the week. That combination — high availability, cheap borrow, shorts trimming — looks more like measured repositioning than a conviction-driven squeeze. The lending market gives bears room to add if they choose, and there is no mechanical pressure forcing them out.
Options tell a subtly different story. The put/call ratio has ticked up to 0.47, about 1.5 standard deviations above its 20-day average of 0.43 — not extreme, but the highest single-day reading in recent weeks. Given the stock is rallying into earnings, that marginal uptick in put demand is worth noting. It may reflect traders hedging a long position rather than outright bearish conviction, which would be consistent with the short interest retreat. The two signals together — shorts trimming, puts nudging higher — describe a market that is becoming less aggressively negative, but not yet comfortable going long without protection.
On the Street, Goldman Sachs is the clearest recent move: analyst Michael Ng raised his target from $17 to $21 while keeping a Neutral rating, reported on July 9. That puts Goldman essentially in line with the consensus mean target of around $20.60, roughly 11% above the current price. Bulls at Citigroup and Needham still carry Buy ratings with targets of $25, while Truist and TD Cowen sit at Hold. The bull case centres on the bank charter advantage and SoFi's fast-growing technology services division, which underpins the multiple-expansion narrative. Bears point to the weaker Q1 guidance, a 2026 outlook that strips out rate-cut tailwinds, and ongoing regulatory risk for a business still reliant on private credit markets. The factor score picture is mixed: EPS surprise ranks at the 62nd percentile — decent — but the short score rank sits at just the 8th percentile, meaning almost every other stock in the universe carries less short pressure on this metric.
CEO Anthony Noto added to his position on June 16, buying 13,888 shares at roughly $18.06 for around $251,000. That purchase coincided with a wave of sells from other executives — the CTO sold $1.8 million worth on June 17, and multiple EVPs and the Chief Risk Officer sold on June 16. Net insider activity over the past 90 days is slightly positive at roughly 616,000 shares, though the majority of that reflects the CEO's purchase against routine executive sales. Noto's continued buying at current price levels is a signal worth tracking, but the broader insider picture is not decisively bullish.
Close peer UPST fell 4% on the week while SoFi gained 4.5%, a notable divergence in names that typically move together at a 76% correlation. DAVE surged 8.6% over the same period. The fintech lending cohort has been volatile, and SoFi's outperformance this week may partly reflect short covering ahead of the July 27 earnings release. The prior two earnings prints averaged a move of roughly 6-7% on the day, with Q1 2026 delivering a sharp 12% single-day drop. Whether the current short base — still at 15.5% of float — sets up for another outsized move in either direction is the question that will dominate the next twelve days.
See the live data behind this article on ORTEX.
Open SOFI 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.
