Rogers Communications enters the back half of August with a short interest position that has been building steadily since early July, even as the stock has managed a modest recovery from recent lows.
The headline number is not extreme — short interest runs at roughly 3.7% of the free float — but the direction of travel is worth noting. From around 13.9 million shares short in mid-July, the position stepped up to 14.6 million in late July and then jumped again to 15.9 million shares as of early August, where it has held flat since. That 14.6% climb over the past month represents the clearest signal that bearish conviction on Rogers has been quietly growing, even as the stock added about 2.7% over the same period. The borrow market itself is far from constrained. Availability remains extremely loose at over 1,000% — meaning shares available to borrow far outnumber those already lent out — and the cost to borrow is a negligible 0.55%, roughly half where it was a month ago. There is no mechanical pressure on existing shorts here, and no technical squeeze setup. The ORTEX short score, drifting upward from 40.7 to 42.3 over the past two weeks, reflects the accumulating bearish positioning without yet reaching levels that would flash any alarm.
The Street's read on Rogers is broadly constructive but growing stale. The mean analyst price target was sitting near CAD 60 as of late July — roughly 20% above the current CAD 49.90 close — though no analyst moves have been recorded since then, and the data is now beyond the threshold for fresh consideration. What the Street is clearly not worried about near-term is the dividend, which scores in the 94th percentile on ORTEX's dividend factor ranking. The EV/EBITDA multiple of 7.7x has been essentially flat over the past month, suggesting the market has not reacted sharply to either the recent earnings print or the broader telecom sector moves. The P/E of roughly 10.5x is undemanding, though the earnings yield factor ranks only in the 8th percentile on surprise history — meaning Rogers has a long record of missing or barely meeting estimates, a dynamic that tends to keep a valuation ceiling in place.
The institutional flow picture offers one genuinely interesting wrinkle. Fidelity International trimmed its position by over 6.7 million shares in the quarter ended June 30, a meaningful reduction for a holder that had been among the larger outside investors. Morgan Stanley, by contrast, added nearly 3.8 million shares in the same period. BMO Asset Management and RBC Global Asset Management both added modestly in late July. The Rogers Control Trust, which holds 27.3% of shares and has not changed its position, continues to define the governance structure of the company more than any institutional flow does.
On the earnings side, Rogers' last quarterly print on July 22 saw the stock fall 5.4% on the day before recovering to close the five-day window with a gain of just 0.7%. The pattern is consistent with a stock where initial reactions to results tend to be negative but short-lived. The next event is flagged for October 23. Between now and then, the dynamic worth tracking is whether short sellers continue adding to the 15.9 million share position, or whether the stock's slow grind higher — up around 1.5% on the week — begins to discourage further accumulation in a market where the borrow is cheap and available but the thesis has yet to generate meaningful downside.
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