SkinHealth Systems reports its Q1 results today with short sellers firmly in control of the narrative.
Short interest is the dominant story here. Bears have built a substantial position — 12.9% of the free float is currently sold short, a level that has crept up 8% over the past month and roughly 2.4% in the past week alone. The ORTEX short score of 82.4 places the stock in the 98th percentile of shorts by rank, a reading that has held steady above 82 for the past two weeks and shows no sign of retreat. Days to cover run above 30, meaning even a moderate covering rally would take time to unwind.
The lending market adds texture but not alarm. Cost to borrow has climbed sharply — up nearly 37% week-on-week to 1.14% — but in absolute terms remains modest enough that this is not yet an expensive borrow. Availability has not compressed to crisis levels, with just under half the lending pool currently utilised compared to a 52-week peak utilisation of 67%. Bears can still find shares. The short thesis does not face a mechanical squeeze.
Options positioning reinforces the bull-leaning skew in derivatives. The put/call ratio is running at 0.13, well below its 20-day average of 0.17 and close to the bottom of its 52-week range. Options buyers are overwhelmingly skewed toward calls rather than puts — an unusual contrast given the weight of short interest, and a sign that some participants are positioning for a positive surprise rather than hedging against downside.
The analyst community offers little encouragement to either camp. Coverage is uniformly at Hold, and targets have drifted lower. Canaccord Genuity trimmed its target to $1.00 from $1.50 earlier this month — the most recent move and now the lowest on the Street, sitting just above the current $0.91 price. The bull case rests on consumables resilience, with spend per U.S. treatment up 10% year-over-year and EMEA growing at 9.3%. Bears counter with a core delivery system placement collapse — down more than 30% year-on-year — which threatens the long-run consumables pipeline that justifies any recovery story. Revenue from delivery systems fell 7.8%, and management's own near-term guidance pointed to continued sales declines.
Insiders have not been buying the dip. The CFO, COO, and Chief Level Officer all sold shares in March and April, small in dollar value but consistently directional. No buyer has stepped in at these levels among the company's own executives.
The Q1 report is therefore a direct test of whether consumables momentum can survive the structural hole left by collapsing hardware placements — and whether management can offer a credible timeline for when delivery system volumes stabilise.
See the live data behind this article on ORTEX.
Open SKIN on ORTEX →ORTEX Market Intelligence content is generated by AI from a snapshot of ORTEX's proprietary data. Content is informational only and does not constitute investment advice.
