Earnings Week Dominates as Bears and Insiders Make Their Moves

Earnings on Deck

This week is one of the busiest on the earnings calendar. Berkshire Hathaway released Q2 2026 results this morning. Cisco Systems reports Wednesday after the bell. Applied Materials closes the week on Thursday. Both carry market caps above $400 billion. Danish wind energy firm Vestas Wind Systems also reports Wednesday, adding a European dimension to a chipmaker-heavy week.

Bears Pile Into Semiconductors

Options and short interest data tell the same story: bears are targeting chips. Sandisk and Micron Technology lead the US market in negative options volume over seven days. Sandisk is up 411% year-to-date — a natural hedge target. Advanced Micro Devices also sits high on the bearish list ahead of its results. Short interest in Wolfspeed remains extreme at 78.6% of free float. Zero shares are left to borrow. Hertz is close behind at 65.4%, with availability also dried up entirely.

Insiders Cash Out

The biggest insider story of the week is Illumina. Board member Keith Meister filed $148M in sales on August 6. That is the largest single-name insider exit filed in the US this week. Charles Schwab founder filed nearly $35M in sales. His daughter, a board director, added another $4.8M. Three Schwab insiders sold a combined $40M in two weeks.

Analysts Raise Pharma Targets

AbbVie hit a fresh analyst consensus high of $273.86. Amgen targets also rose to $378.31. On the downside, Paramount Skydance saw its consensus target cut to $9.81 — while its short interest sits at 9.7% of free float.