FirstEnergy Corp. reports Q1 2026 results on April 29 with the analyst community in a notably constructive mood — but options traders are leaning the other way.
The most striking pre-earnings signal is in options positioning. Calls are dominating the order flow in a way that is unusually bullish for this stock. The put/call ratio has dropped to 0.61, more than 1.3 standard deviations below its 20-day mean of 0.66, and close to the 52-week low of 0.51. That shift has been sharp: the ratio ran near 0.70 through most of early April before falling away in the final week of trading. Investors appear to have added call exposure into the print rather than hedging with puts.
Short interest offers little countervailing pressure. At roughly 4.2% of the free float — down 10% on the month and 6% over the past week — bearish positioning has been unwinding. Borrowing costs have followed: at 0.42%, cost-to-borrow is near its lowest reading of the past month and has fallen about 21% in a week. Availability remains generous, suggesting no meaningful squeeze risk in the lending market. Taken together, the borrow picture points to bears losing conviction heading into the quarter.
The Street's direction of travel has been firmly upward. Multiple firms raised price targets in the six weeks before this print. JPMorgan moved to $55 in mid-March, Barclays lifted to $53 in early April, Jefferies nudged up to $52 on April 21, and TD Cowen initiated with a $56 target just days earlier. The consensus mean target now sits around $53, about 7% above the current price of $49.58, and the stock's forward EPS growth ranks near the top of its peer group — in the 94th percentile on 12-month forward EPS year-on-year improvement. The bull case centres on rate-base growth, infrastructure investment tailwinds, and a re-rating story still in progress. Bears point to net debt of roughly $29.7 billion against annual EBITDA near $5 billion and a capital expenditure programme running at almost $5.8 billion annually — a financial profile that leaves limited room for error.
The CFO and COO both sold shares in late February near $51, and the CFO made an additional sale in mid-March. None of the trades were large relative to the company's float, but the net selling tone from senior executives at prices above the current level is a note of caution against the otherwise bullish backdrop.
The print will test whether the company's operational progress — and the rate case developments investors have been rewarding all year — can justify the Street's freshly raised targets at a moment when calls outnumber puts by the widest margin in recent memory.
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