SELX heads into its May 8 earnings release with a striking split: short sellers have been cutting exposure sharply, yet the cost to borrow the stock is among the most punishing in the semiconductor universe.
The borrow market tells a complicated story. Cost to borrow is running at 317% annualised — roughly double where it was at the start of April, when it was closer to 165%. That is an extraordinary premium to maintain a short position for any length of time. Yet despite that cost, availability has loosened meaningfully this week. Availability tightened severely in mid-April, when the lending pool was essentially fully drawn down and the borrow market was at its tightest. It has since eased back — roughly half the borrowed shares returned over the past few sessions — suggesting some short sellers are simply unwilling to keep paying that carry. The ORTEX short score of 59.2 is elevated but has edged down from a recent peak near 61.8 on April 27, consistent with that de-positioning.
Short interest itself has pulled back sharply. SI % of free float dropped to around 1.1% by April 30, down from a peak near 3.9% in early April when tariff volatility was driving heavy short activity into smaller-cap tech names. That April spike — from under 1% to nearly 4% in a matter of days — was dramatic, but it reversed almost as fast. The current level is modest in absolute terms. What remains is not a crowded short book, but a very expensive one for those still in it.
The stock's own price movement underscores the tension. SELX closed at $0.395 on May 1, down 6.3% on the week. That comes after a remarkable 62% rally over the past month. The prior earnings release on April 15 produced a 1-day gain of nearly 9%, with a 5-day gain of 25%. The November 2025 earnings event was more extreme in both directions — a 103% single-day spike followed by a 55% gain over five days, though a separate November 14 event saw a 38% five-day drawdown. The pattern is erratic: SELX around earnings is a high-variance event.
Ownership is heavily concentrated. The top two named holders — Yung-Peng Chang and Chih-Wei Wang — together control over 52% of shares outstanding, with filings through October 2025. Meteora Capital holds a further 6.6%. That concentration reduces the effective free float materially, which helps explain why borrow availability can swing between fully constrained and looser within days. A thin lending pool amplifies every change in short demand.
The next print on May 8 is the number to watch: with cost to borrow still above 300%, availability fluctuating, and a stock that has historically moved hard in either direction around results, the setup heading into the release is anything but settled.
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