Church & Dwight enters its May 1 Q1 2026 earnings release with options positioning firmly in call territory — an unusually bullish lean for a consumer staples name.
The clearest signal is in the options market. Traders are skewing decisively toward calls, with the put/call ratio running at just 0.26, more than a standard deviation below its 20-day average of 0.32. That makes this among the least defensively positioned reads of the past year; the 52-week high on the PCR sits at 2.55, making the current read look notably relaxed. The stock has broadly tracked this mood: up roughly 1% over the past month to $95.40, though it gave back just over 1% on the week.
Short interest reinforces the benign picture. Bears have been stepping back — SI as a percentage of the free float has fallen 15% over the past month, dropping to 3.2% of float as of April 24. Utilization is a mere 2.6%, well off its 52-week peak of 7.9%, and borrowing costs remain negligible at around 0.49% APR. The lending market is showing no signs of squeeze pressure. Days to cover, per official FINRA data, is just over four days — meaning any sudden rush to cover would face minimal friction.
Analysts are cautious but not overtly bearish ahead of the print. Several desks — including JP Morgan and Barclays — trimmed targets in April while holding their existing ratings, a pattern that suggests measured recalibration rather than conviction selling. Wells Fargo, the lone bull among recent movers, cut its target to $105 while keeping an Overweight. The consensus mean target is $101.53 against the current $95.40 price, leaving around 6.5% implied upside. Bulls point to CHD's track record of share gains, with nine of fourteen major brands growing market share in Q1 and 80% of the business expanding on a volume basis — a quality-of-earnings argument. Bears counter with a harder structural thesis: projected top-line CAGR of roughly 2% through 2034, guidance already revised down 250 basis points, and ongoing tariff and retailer destocking headwinds that weigh on the forward margin profile. Note that the bear/bull case data carries a late-2025 timestamp, so some tariff specifics may have evolved since.
Historically, CHD has rewarded holders after results. The last three prints each produced positive one-day moves of 3.3%, 5.9%, and 5.5%, with five-day follow-through of 1.7%, 9.3%, and 6.2% respectively — a consistent pattern of post-earnings relief or re-rating. The Q1 release will test whether that trend can survive the current macro backdrop, and whether management's language on tariff exposure and full-year guidance revisions can satisfy a market priced for moderate optimism but not euphoria.
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