NBIS Bears Still Trapped — Stock Blows Past Analyst Targets After 46% Week

Nebius Group has moved violently against its short book again, surging 46% on the week to $268.85 and leaving an already painful short position looking increasingly untenable.

The week's central tension is a short base that hasn't capitulated against a stock that has now more than doubled since June. Short interest remains heavy at 27.6% of the free float — roughly 60.3 million shares — barely changed from the 27.6% noted in the August 12 article. The important development is what the borrow market is doing. Availability, which had briefly opened to 30% on August 14, has snapped shut again to 12% — tight, but not yet at the near-zero extremes that dominated late July and early August. For context, availability was at 6.6% on August 11 and hit its tightest reading of the past year at just 0.6%. The current 12% reading means roughly one share is available for every eight already borrowed — constrained, but with room to tighten further. Cost to borrow has drifted back to 1.08%, having spiked to 1.27% last Thursday before easing. Borrow conditions are firming, not yet extreme. In options, sentiment has rotated meaningfully bullish. The put/call ratio dropped to 0.95, well below its 20-day average of 1.07 — traders have pivoted from the defensive posture that prevailed through most of July, when the PCR ran near 1.3, toward a clear call-heavy lean. The z-score of -0.77 is not yet extreme, but the directional shift is real.

Analyst coverage has moved sharply higher since the August 12 print, and the Street is now split between cautious holders and aggressive bulls. Citigroup raised its target to $324 from $278, maintaining Buy. Baird lifted to $340 from $250, also keeping Outperform. Those moves follow Northland Capital Markets, which pushed its target all the way to $410 back in July. Against that, DA Davidson — which had previously sat at $250 before cutting to $175 in early August — raised back to $250 today, but kept its Neutral rating. Piper Sandler initiated in early August at $224 with a Neutral. The mean analyst price target, at $274.57, is now close to the current price; the stock has effectively run through consensus in a single week. The bull case centres on the Microsoft partnership, vertically integrated GPUaaS model, and the $775 million bond issuance providing non-dilutive growth capital. EPS momentum is exceptional — ranking in the 99th percentile on the 30-day measure — though the company remains unprofitable, with a P/E that is deeply negative and an EV/EBITDA that has been contracting. The short score of 70.3 is elevated and has been remarkably stable across the past two weeks, suggesting no broad short-side capitulation despite the share price action.

Institutional ownership tells an interesting sub-story. Goldman Sachs holds 8.4% of shares — with a reported addition of more than 20 million shares in its last filing — making it the second-largest external holder behind founder Arkady Volozh at 10.8%. BlackRock added a further 1.6 million shares as of July 31. These are not passive-flow positions; the Goldman build in particular is substantial. Against that, the Chairman of the Board, John Boynton, sold approximately 5,500 shares across multiple tranches on July 15 at prices around $195 — well below the current level, which either reflects routine selling or a view that the stock was approaching fair value at the time. Net insider activity over the past 90 days is positive at roughly $138 million, but the bulk of that is likely concentrated in the institutional-class positions rather than open-market executive buying.

The August 12 earnings print produced a 32% single-day gain — a result that directly inverted the bearish positioning that had built through July and into the August report. The prior earnings cycle on July 28 moved the stock down 21% on the day before recovering 20% over the following week. The pattern across both cycles is the same: extreme short positioning, a large immediate move in either direction, followed by availability tightening sharply as the lending pool fills back up. With short interest still near 28% of float and the stock now trading at $268, each further leg higher mechanically deepens the loss on a position that has already survived two brutal squeezes.

The next scheduled catalyst is earnings on November 12. Between now and then, the data to watch is whether availability drops back toward the sub-5% readings of late July — which would signal the lending pool is fully exhausted again — or whether the week's rally prompts any meaningful short covering that loosens the borrow market and reduces the squeeze pressure.