FIZZ at UBS's Target — Options Turn More Bullish Still

FIZZ heads into its September 15 earnings release trading at $31.37 — now actually below the $32 target set by its sole covering analyst, a relationship that has inverted since our last preview.

Options positioning has grown notably more bullish in the days since that prior article. The put/call ratio has slipped further to 0.30, roughly 1.2 standard deviations below its 20-day mean of 0.34. That continues a clear directional trend: the PCR has fallen steadily from above 0.44 in early August to its current level, suggesting call interest is building ahead of the print rather than put protection. The contrast with a persistent Sell rating from UBS is the central tension in this setup — options traders are positioned for a positive surprise while the only analyst following the stock has spent a year marking down expectations.

That analyst, UBS's Peter Grom, has now cut his target six times since late 2025, moving it from $45 to $32 in roughly twelve months. The most recent reduction, filed September 4, left the target at $32 against a price that has since dipped below it. The bear case remains unchanged: a stretched PE near 26x and EV/EBITDA around 18x are difficult to justify for a company whose growth rests almost entirely on the LaCroix brand with no clear volume catalyst on the horizon. The bull case is structural — LaCroix retains strong category positioning in flavored sparkling water, and the company's lean cost base means margins can hold even on soft volumes. A $3.25 special dividend declared in July shows the balance sheet remains healthy, even if the stock's forward dividend yield is effectively zero on a recurring basis.

Short interest tells a relatively calm story into the print. SI has risen about 19% over the past month to 4.6% of the free float — elevated enough to note, but not extreme. Borrow is cheap at under 0.5%, and availability is wide at roughly 782% of SI, meaning the lending market is loose and there is no meaningful squeeze pressure. The ORTEX short score of 64 is moderate and has been stable. Recent earnings history offers a consistent data point: the prior three prints each produced positive one-day moves of between 1.5% and 6.8%, with the five-day follow-through also positive in two of those three cases.

The September 15 print will test whether the LaCroix brand can demonstrate even modest volume recovery — enough to validate a stock that, for the first time in this cycle, is trading below the bear's own price target.