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Every share of QUBT available to lend is already out on loan. That structural tightness is now pulling in options traders, creating a three-way convergence of signals across the lending, short positioning, and derivatives markets.
Availability has been at or near 0% for the past six weeks. The borrow market for Quantum Computing Inc. has been effectively closed since early September, yet short interest has continued to climb. Bears added roughly 7.1 million shares over the past week alone, pushing estimated short interest to 31% of free float as of 13 October.
That math raises an obvious question. If no shares are available to borrow, how does short interest keep rising? The answer lies in the mechanics of the lending market: existing borrows roll over, and intraday activity within prime brokerage books can allow incremental positioning even when headline availability reads zero. What matters is that the cost to borrow, at 11.2%, remains high but has actually eased about 28% over the past month, suggesting some pressure came off earlier and bears locked in borrows before that window closed further.
The ORTEX short score stands at 84.8, in the top percentile of all stocks by short-side conviction, and the utilization rank sits at the 1st percentile. Days to cover, per the most recent FINRA fortnightly data, is 8.6 days.
The put-call ratio hit 0.6758 on 13 October. That is 2.75 standard deviations above its 20-day mean of 0.58. It is not yet at the 52-week high of 1.23, so there is room for hedging demand to intensify further. The jump in the PCR over the past two sessions, from 0.56 to 0.68, coincides precisely with the acceleration in short interest. Options are being used as an alternative route to negative exposure when the borrow market is shut.
Retail attention for QUBT is elevated. Wikipedia-based attention scored a z-score of 2.08 against its own 90-day history as of late September, a measure of how much the stock is being tracked, not a revenue or earnings indicator.
Analyst opinion is split. Ascendiant Capital raised its target to $32 in August. Cantor Fitzgerald and Wedbush both hold Neutral ratings with targets of $10 and $12, against a closing price of $6.87 on 13 October. The mean analyst target across all coverage is $18.67, implying the bear camp is significantly closer to current prices than the bull camp.
BlackRock added 1.6 million shares as of 30 September. Penserra Capital added 3.6 million shares in the same period. CEO Yuping Huang holds a 13D activist position at 10.33% of shares outstanding, filed as of May 2026, as last disclosed.
Next earnings are scheduled for 13 November, 30 days away.
See the live data behind this article on ORTEX.
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