JSW — Jastrzębska Spółka Węglowa — reports Thursday morning with bears as entrenched as at any point in the current pre-earnings run, and the stock pulling back 3% on Monday to close at PLN 27.4.
The lending market remains the defining feature of this setup. Availability has edged up to just under 10% — roughly nine shares lent out for every one still free to borrow — a modest loosening from the August 10 trough of 4.4% but still deeply constrained by any normal standard. The 52-week floor was 2.9%, hit on July 14; the current level is barely seven percentage points above that. Cost to borrow has climbed to 10.3%, a 24% jump over the past week and back near the highs last seen in early July. Every ORTEX borrow metric points in the same direction: bears are paying more to stay short, and there is very little room left in the lending pool for new positions.
The short score has held at 85.4 — unchanged from the reading flagged in yesterday's note — and has now ground higher in every session since the start of August, rising from 72.8 at the end of July. JSW ranks in the 1st percentile of the ORTEX universe on this measure. Days-to-cover and availability rank both sit in the bottom 3rd percentile. Monday's 3% price decline reverses part of the stock's recent run, but it does not change the positioning picture: bears have not covered, and the borrow market has not loosened materially.
The analyst consensus offers faint support for the other side. Three analysts cover the stock, with one buy and two holds, and a mean price target of PLN 22.99 — well below the current price, a gap that underlines how out of consensus the recent rally has been. EPS momentum factor scores rank in the 89th and 98th percentiles on 30-day and 90-day windows respectively, suggesting the earnings trend has been improving even as the stock's fundamental quality scores remain weak. The EV/EBITDA multiple has compressed to 2.5x, and the stock trades at just 0.54x book value — metrics that provide a valuation floor argument, but the absence of recent analyst upgrades means that argument has few institutional voices behind it.
Thursday's print is therefore a direct test of whether improving earnings momentum is enough to dislodge one of the most heavily entrenched short positions in the ORTEX universe — or whether the bears, paying 10% to stay short, get the vindication they have been waiting for since July.
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