KORU Options Flip Bullish as Borrow Market Loosens

KORU, the Direxion Daily MSCI South Korea Bull 3X Shares ETF, is sending a split signal this week: the borrow market is quietly easing while options traders have made a sharp pivot toward calls — a contrast that deserves attention given where this fund has been.

The options shift is the most notable development since the previous note. The put/call ratio has dropped to 0.95, well below its 20-day average of 1.35 — roughly one standard deviation below normal. That's a meaningful turn. Through most of June and into early July, KORU's PCR was running between 1.5 and 2.1, reflecting heavy demand for downside protection. The move to sub-1.0 territory this week suggests options participants are no longer leaning defensively. The 52-week PCR range spans from 0 all the way to 2.62, so the current reading is closer to the bullish extreme than the bearish one.

The borrow picture tells a consistent story, though the framing matters. As covered in the prior note, reported short interest exceeds 1,100% of free float — an artifact of how leveraged ETF share creation and lending mechanics interact, not a simple measure of directional bears. What has changed since then is availability. After sitting at or near zero through most of early-to-mid July — the lending pool was effectively fully drawn — availability has climbed back to around 53%. That's still tight by historical standards (the 52-week high is 256%, reached in late June when the structural shift in short interest had not yet occurred), but it represents a genuine loosening. Cost to borrow has also eased, falling 20% on the week to 10.7%, after peaking near 13.8% in early July. The direction of travel in the lending market has reversed, even if absolute levels remain elevated.

The ORTEX short score is holding at 71.8 — essentially flat for two weeks now. That persistence is itself informative. The score has not collapsed despite the availability improvement and the options pivot, which suggests the model is still registering the structural weight of shares-on-loan rather than treating the recent loosening as a clean all-clear. The fund itself bounced 18% on July 21 after losing more than 60% over the prior month, so the price action is violent in both directions — a feature of 3x leverage into South Korean equities rather than a signal in isolation.

The next session to watch is whether PCR continues its descent toward the low end of its annual range, or whether the put-buying resumes as the post-bounce dust settles and traders reassess Korean macro conditions against the fund's still-compressed price.