NOK heads into Thursday's Q2 results after one of its worst months in recent memory, down 28% over the past month and nearly 19% in the past week alone to close at $10.12.
The price collapse has transformed the lending picture dramatically. Borrow availability has exploded — shares available to lend now represent roughly 9,200% of current short interest, up from just 221% at the start of June. That flood of supply into the lending pool tells a clear story: short sellers who had been building positions earlier in the summer have largely covered and walked away. Short interest itself peaked above 67 million shares in early June and has since fallen to around 58.5 million, a decline of roughly 14% over six weeks. Cost to borrow remains minimal at 0.50%. The shorts that remain are not under pressure, but the crowd has thinned considerably. Options positioning corroborates that picture — the put/call ratio is running at 0.33, slightly below its 20-day average and far from any defensive extreme. Investors heading into this print are not meaningfully hedged for downside, despite the stock already pricing in significant damage.
The bull and bear debate circles around whether that damage is already sufficient. JP Morgan's Sandeep Deshpande raised his target aggressively in June — from $14 to $21 — maintaining an Overweight rating, a move that stands well above the current price and implies the selloff is overdone. The consensus mean target sits near $15, which is about 50% above the current level. Bears point to the valuation multiples compressing sharply with the share price: the forward P/E has contracted by more than 8 turns over the past 30 days to around 23x, and EV/EBITDA has fallen roughly 1.5 turns to 13.8x. The bull case rests on Nokia's forward EPS growth trajectory — the 12-month forward earnings growth factor scores in the 93rd percentile across the universe — and the dividend yield, which ranks at the 97th percentile. The bear case is simpler: the stock spent much of the first half of 2026 well above $15, and the swift unwind suggests that the previous narrative of a 5G recovery and enterprise networking recovery has hit a credibility problem.
The institutional ownership picture is worth noting. FMR (Fidelity) added aggressively in the most recent quarter — buying around 54.6 million additional shares to reach a 9.3% position, its largest disclosed stake. That purchase was made at prices well above current levels. Insider activity from late May also shows C-suite buying at prices between $15.50 and $16, again well above where the stock trades now. Those buyers are deeply underwater heading into the report. The April 2026 earnings print produced a 6% one-day gain and a remarkable 31% five-day rally — suggesting Nokia's prints can be violent in either direction when expectations are properly reset.
Thursday's report tests whether the 28% drawdown reflects a genuine deterioration in the network equipment cycle or a panic that the underlying business numbers are about to disprove.
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