SF reported earnings on July 22, and the options market's pre-print bullishness has not reversed — call positioning remains historically dominant even as short sellers continue to rebuild quietly.
The call skew is the standout signal this week. The put/call ratio has dropped further to 0.14, now nearly 2.4 standard deviations below its 20-day average of 0.24. That is the most one-sided call-heavy reading in recent memory, against a 52-week high for the ratio of 1.46 — meaning options traders who were braced for upside ahead of the print have not yet unwound. The stock itself is up 1.7% on the week to $77.61, adding modestly to the recovery that was already underway heading into results.
Short interest tells a more cautious story beneath the surface. Shorts have added 31% to their positions over the past month, pushing SI to 4.2% of the free float — a meaningful build, even if the absolute level remains unalarming. That climb has continued through this week, with a further 0.7% added. Borrowing costs have picked up noticeably, rising 36% over the week to 0.62% — still low in absolute terms, but the pace of the move is worth noting. The lending pool itself remains vast: availability is essentially unlimited, with shares available to borrow running many multiples of current short interest, so there is no squeeze pressure. The bear thesis is building incrementally, not aggressively.
The Street broadly retains a constructive view, though targets have come in. UBS kept its Buy rating in early July but trimmed its target from $89 to $86 — the second consecutive cut from the same analyst, from $100 in April. The consensus mean target sits near $85, roughly 10% above the current price. Some older targets well above current levels reflect pre-2026 assumptions and are less instructive at this point. On valuation, SF trades at a trailing P/E near 11.6 and price-to-book of 1.93, both of which have drifted higher over the past month. The dividend-score factor ranks in the 99th percentile, though the dividend data itself is dated — the most recent payments on record run through 2022. EPS surprise ranks in the 71st percentile, suggesting a track record of beating estimates.
Among close peers, PIPR gained 3.1% on the week and LPLA added 2.1%, both outpacing SF's 1.7% move. EVR slipped 0.5% and CG fell 1.9%, underperforming as the group's performance diverged across the week. SF sits near the middle of its peer group — neither the week's clear winner nor its laggard.
What to watch now is whether the call-heavy options positioning normalises in the days following the print, and whether the gradual short-interest build continues at its recent pace or plateaus once any post-earnings catalyst has been digested.
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