The gold miners ETF has rallied 38% in a month. Now the lending market is flashing its tightest signal in a year.
Availability on GDX has collapsed to 55% — down from 130% just one week ago. That means only about one share is available to borrow for every two already lent out. Five days ago, lenders held a comfortable cushion. Today, that cushion is gone.
The shift is abrupt and tells a clear story. Through most of July, availability sat above 150%. Bears had room to build positions. Then gold miners caught a bid — GDX up 14% in the past week alone, 38% over the past month — and the dynamic flipped hard.
Short interest is 12.5% of the free float. That's still a significant position. But the ability to sustain or add to those shorts is deteriorating fast.
Cost to borrow confirms the tightening. CTB jumped 63% in a single week to 0.81%. A week ago it was 0.50%. A month ago it was closer to 0.66%. The direction is unmistakably higher.
The 52-week low for availability on GDX is 9.3%. The current reading of 55% is still above that floor — but the speed of the move matters. Availability fell 57% in a single week. That pace of tightening rarely happens without consequence for shorts already in the trade.
New short positions are getting meaningfully more expensive to initiate. Existing shorts face rising carry costs. Morgan Stanley added 4.55 million shares in the most recent reported quarter, while Goldman Sachs trimmed 2.52 million. The institutional picture is mixed — but the flow into the ETF from buyers is clearly overwhelming the bears.
The put/call ratio sits at 1.40, slightly above its 20-day mean of 1.36. That's not an extreme reading — the z-score is just 0.75. But it does suggest options participants maintain a hedged posture even as the ETF surges. The 52-week PCR high is 2.06; the current level is nowhere near panic territory. Puts are being bought, but not at a rate that signals capitulation or fear of reversal.
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