W. P. Carey heads into its April 28 earnings call with short interest down sharply and muted options sentiment. The diversified REIT has seen bearish positioning unwind over the past month even as analysts nudge targets higher.
Short interest stands at 7.49 million shares as of April 23, representing 3.42% of the float. That marks a 32% decline over the past month, though the metric ticked up 2.2% over the past week. Days to cover sits at 6.61 according to the April 15 FINRA report. Cost to borrow remains negligible at 0.47%, down 5.4% over the past week. Utilisation is low at 7.79%, well below the 52-week high of 13.54% hit in late March.
The put/call ratio sits at 0.23, below the 20-day mean of 0.27. The z-score of -1.55 signals call-heavy positioning relative to recent norms. The PCR remains near the bottom of its 52-week range of 0.19 to 0.47.
Wall Street shows no consensus rating in the snapshot, though the mean price target of $74.83 sits just above the current $73.12 close. Recent changes skew cautiously constructive. Raymond James upgraded WPC to Outperform from Market Perform on March 17, announcing a $76 target. Evercore's Steve Sakwa raised his In-Line target to $75 the same day. Barclays lifted its Underweight target twice, most recently to $72 on April 21. UBS raised to $75 in early March. Benzinga's bull case cites higher AFFO estimates and reduced credit loss expectations. The bear case warns of below-average tenant credit quality and geopolitical exposure from the REIT's international holdings.
The P/E ratio stands at 27.73, up 2.38 points over the past month. Price-to-book rose to 1.99, climbing 0.18 over 30 days. EV/EBITDA sits at 15.67, down slightly from a month ago. WPC ranks in the 99th percentile on 12-month forward EPS growth momentum and the 73rd percentile on dividend score. Quality and value ML scores are unavailable.
Insiders sold $1.2 million net over the past 90 days, primarily CFO ToniAnn Sanzone and managing directors in mid-February. State Street Global Advisors holds 5.6% of shares, adding 59,729 in the quarter ended March 31. UBS Asset Management boosted its stake by 2 million shares to 1.6% as of year-end.
WPC reported most recently on February 10. The company has a pattern of evening or after-hours releases.
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