ET Insiders Buy the Dip as Analysts Line Up Behind a $25 Target

Energy Transfer LP heads into the final stretch of September with a notable split: the stock is down nearly 2% on the week, yet its founder just spent $21 million buying units in the open market.

The insider signal is the standout this week. Kelcy Warren, Energy Transfer's founder and largest single holder with a 13.2% stake, made two open-market purchases on August 18 and 19 — spending roughly $21.3 million combined to acquire one million units at prices around $21.26. Neither trade was made under a 10b5-1 plan. Director James Richard Perry added a smaller $250,000 purchase on August 7. Net insider buying over the past 90 days totals just over $21.5 million across roughly 1 million units — all discretionary, all in the open market. For a partnership trading at $21.14, that is a meaningful personal commitment from the man who built the business.

The lending market tells a completely different story — one of almost no bearish conviction at all. Short interest is just 0.77% of the free float, down nearly 8% on the week after a notable step-down in borrowed shares around September 10. Borrow costs are negligible at 0.42%, and availability is essentially unlimited — the lending pool has more than 271 million shares sitting unused, a ratio that puts availability in "fully loose" territory by any measure. The short score of 30.9 places ET in the 70th percentile for low short pressure. Bears simply are not showing up here.

Options positioning confirms the same relaxed tone. The put/call ratio is running at 0.19, almost exactly in line with its 20-day average and sitting near the lower end of its 52-week range. There is no sign of hedging demand, no defensive repositioning — options traders are treating ET as a hold-and-collect name rather than a trade around a catalyst.

The Street has largely converged on a constructive view. JP Morgan raised its target to $25 from $24 earlier this month while maintaining Overweight. Stifel reinstated coverage with a Buy at $25 on September 10. Before that, Morgan Stanley lifted its Equal-Weight target to $25, and Truist and TD Cowen both moved their Buy targets to the same level. The analyst consensus is Buy, with a mean target of $24.58 — about 16% above the current price of $21.14. The bull case rests on gathering volume growth of roughly 25% since early 2022, strategic control of assets including Sunoco, and a distribution yield that the dividend factor score ranks in the 92nd percentile. Bears point to capital expenditure creep that pushed free cash flow negative in Q2, a backlog that contracted 19% year-on-year, and gross margin pressure that prompted forward estimates to be trimmed.

Peer performance this week adds a mild headwind context. OKE fell 3.3% and KNTK dropped 2.3%, suggesting sector-wide softness rather than anything ET-specific. KMI and TRGP bucked the move, gaining 3.2% and 0.7% respectively, while EPD was essentially flat. ET's 1.9% weekly decline lands it roughly in the middle of the midstream pack.

With the next earnings print scheduled for November 4, the key question over the coming weeks is whether the Q3 throughput data — when it emerges — validates the bullish gathering volume narrative or deepens the free cash flow concern that has kept a lid on the unit price despite a strong year-to-date run.