The week ahead is headlined by Home Depot, reporting Tuesday August 18. Consumer resilience is the central question. Progressive Corporation follows Wednesday. It has been among 2026's best-performing insurers. In Europe, QBE Insurance Group already posted results Friday. Results from Japanese sportswear brand ASICS also hit today, with eyes on Asian demand trends.
Bears were active across the week. CoreCivic saw the sharpest shift — short interest jumped from 2.3% to nearly 10% of free float in seven days. That is a +7.6 percentage point leap. Wolfspeed remains the most extreme case: 85% of free float is short, zero availability left to borrow. is also drawing fresh bear attention after earnings, even as analysts hold a bullish $33 target. Meanwhile, shorts are losing ground — bears have dropped another week.
Bill Gates filed purchases of over $108 million in Republic Services shares, spread across seven trades on August 10–11. That is one of the week's biggest insider moves by a wide margin. At Boston Scientific, CEO Michael Mahoney spent $9 million buying his own stock. Both the CEO and a director at Aptiv also filed buys totalling $7.5 million combined.
Options traders are loading up on semiconductor names. Micron leads positive bets, up 240% year-to-date. Analysts still see 54% more upside. In contrast, utilities saw a wave of analyst recommendation removals. NRG Energy took a target price cut. Vistra Corp lost active analyst coverage. The sector rotation signals caution at the top of a strong utility run.
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.
