Eversource Energy reports Q2 results on July 31 with short sellers meaningfully more active than they were just a week ago — a notable shift from the call-heavy positioning captured in the prior preview.
Short interest has risen sharply into this print. Estimated shares short climbed 22% in a single week to 3.8% of the free float — and are up 39% over the past month. That is a genuine repositioning, not a rounding move. The jump was concentrated around July 23, when shares outstanding short rose from roughly 12 million to over 14 million in two sessions. Borrow costs remain low at 0.63%, and availability is extraordinarily loose at nearly 3,000% — meaning for every share currently borrowed short, roughly 30 more are sitting available. The lending market offers no squeeze risk whatsoever. This is bears adding conviction, not a forced or expensive trade. Options, by contrast, have stayed tilted toward calls: the put/call ratio is 0.26, essentially in line with its 20-day average of 0.27 and well below the 52-week high of 2.94. Options traders are not hedging alongside the short sellers.
Analyst opinion heading into the print is split, and the disagreement is substantive. Citigroup reinstated coverage on July 27 with a Neutral rating and an $81 target — above the current price of $73.84. Wells Fargo has maintained Overweight with a $76 target. Against that, BMO Capital trimmed its target to $72 last week, and Argus Research downgraded to Hold in June. The mean target across the Street is $74.08, barely above where the stock is now. The bull case centres on Eversource's credit-repair plan — roughly $800 million in equity issuance in late 2027 plus potential ATM offerings through 2029 — as a path to financial stability. The bear case is that very same equity program, which analysts expect to compress EPS and dividend-per-share growth below management targets. Regulatory headwinds compound it: a pending refund for over-earning in electric transmission, the risk of further ROE reductions, and ongoing friction in Connecticut rate cases all feature in the negative thesis. The stock's PE of 15.6 and EV/EBITDA of 10.8 have both risen meaningfully over the past month, narrowing the valuation discount to peers that the bears have relied on.
Peers have also retreated in the past week, with LNT off 2.7%, AEP down 2.8%, and PNW losing 3.8%. ES fell 1.2% on Thursday and is down about 1% on the week, putting it roughly mid-pack in an outright sector pullback. After the May earnings release, the stock fell nearly 3% on the day and recovered only marginally over the following five sessions — a pattern of muted but negative initial reactions that makes the recent short build look less contrarian than it might otherwise appear.
The Q2 print will test whether progress on the balance sheet — and any update on the Aquarion Water sale or transmission ROE proceedings — is convincing enough to justify Citi's optimism, or whether the structural dilution headwinds dominating the bear case are moving faster than the recovery story.
See the live data behind this article on ORTEX.
Open ES 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.
