Richardson Electronics enters the week with short sellers in retreat and a fresh strategic partnership grabbing the spotlight.
Short interest has fallen sharply over the past month. At 2.6% of the free float today, it is down from a six-week peak of 3.5% in early April — a 25% drop in shares short. The retreat has been especially pronounced this week: SI dropped another 11% in five sessions alone. That sustained unwind over six weeks points to covering rather than hesitation.
The borrow market tells an easy story. Cost to borrow runs around 0.52% annually — essentially free by any standard — and availability remains wide. The lending pool is barely tapped, with only about 6% of available shares currently out on loan, less than half the 52-week high of 13.3%. There is no squeeze pressure here. Options paint a mildly more alert picture: the put/call ratio has edged up to 0.087, roughly two standard deviations above its 20-day average of 0.077. That looks more like a small hedge being placed than any meaningful defensive rotation, and the absolute PCR level remains close to the lowest readings of the past year. Call dominance is still the prevailing posture.
The catalyst underpinning the price action came just today. Richardson announced a collaboration with Gotion over battery energy storage systems — a direct expansion of its power conversion and grid-storage ambitions. The news arrives after the stock already posted a 13% gain on the day following its most recent earnings release in April, which was followed by a further 5-day move of nearly 12%. Shares have now climbed 13% over the past month to $15.12, with a further 3% gain on the week — a meaningful re-rating for a small-cap technology distributor. The ORTEX short score has drifted lower to 34.4, down from 36.8 a week ago, consistent with shorts losing conviction.
The ownership structure is tightly held. Founder-family interest Edward Richardson controls nearly 14% of shares and trimmed modestly in late 2025. On the sell side, director Kenneth Halverson sold 10,000 shares at $14.69 on May 5 — adding to a February sale at $13.09 — while the CFO has sold smaller tranches across several months. The sales look routine given the rising share price rather than signalling a fundamental concern. On the institutional side, Northland Capital Markets initiated coverage at Outperform with a $13 price target in April 2024 — the only active formal coverage on record — though that target now trails the current price. With the stock trading above that level and no more recent analyst updates available, the Street opinion is effectively stale. Given the Gotion announcement and the April earnings beat, that coverage may be due for a revisit.
Earnings history shows an outsized pattern: the last print delivered a 29% single-day move, followed by a further 18% over five days. The next event is pencilled in for July 22. Between now and then, the Gotion collaboration and Richardson's upcoming presentation at the LD Micro Invitational on May 18 are the next data points worth watching.
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