Lucid Group is heading into its next earnings report with short sellers at their most aggressive in months — and every share in the lending pool already lent out.
Short interest jumped 28% in a single week, vaulting from roughly 27% of the free float to 34.6% by May 12. That is not a gradual drift — it is a step-change, with the bulk of new shorts appearing in the two sessions immediately after the Q1 results landed on May 5. The stock fell 7.5% the day earnings hit and extended the loss to just over 10% over five days. Before that print, SI had been grinding higher from around 25% through April; the post-earnings session accelerated an already established trend into something harder to ignore.
The borrow market underlines how heavily the position is loaded. Availability is effectively zero — the lending pool is fully consumed, a level that has held almost without break since early April. With no spare shares to borrow, the marginal cost of building new shorts has risen to 11.2% annually, down sharply from a peak above 33% in mid-April when the squeeze of that period was at its tightest. Cost to borrow has eased as the stock has fallen and borrow demand has been partially absorbed, but the combination of zero availability and a 34% short base leaves this setup fragile for both sides. The ORTEX short score sits at 78, well into high-conviction bearish territory. Options positioning has actually eased somewhat — the put/call ratio is at 1.32, slightly below its 20-day average of 1.42 — meaning dedicated options traders are less defensively positioned than the short book might imply.
Analyst reaction to the Q1 print was one-directional. TD Cowen cut its target from $10 to $7 while keeping a Hold, and Benchmark downgraded outright to Hold from Buy — both on May 6, the session after results. The street consensus now sits around a $8.70 mean target, which still implies upside from the current $6.01 price, but the direction of travel has been persistently downward: targets have been halved or worse at most houses that have touched the stock in 2026. The sole outlier is Cantor Fitzgerald, which reiterated Neutral with a $14 target in early May — a level the stock has not traded near since January. That gap between the consensus target and the most recent trade reflects genuine disagreement about the terminal value, not a near-term catalyst argument. The bear case is explicit: the company suspended its 2026 guidance, deliveries continue to lag production, and the seat-supply issue that hit Gravity SUV shipments has left inventory building on the lot.
The bull case rests on structural optionality. The expanded robotaxi partnership with Uber adds a commercial angle that pure-play EV comparables lack. Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund holds 45% of shares outstanding — an anchor that constrains the free float and amplifies every directional move. Rivian fell about 4.5% on the week against LCID's 3.8% decline, suggesting the weakness is partially sector-wide rather than purely idiosyncratic; NIO and TSLA both closed the week higher, however, which limits that argument.
Insider activity offers no counterweight. The most recent trades on file show the Acting CEO and CFO both selling in early March at prices around $10.27 — levels the stock has since broken decisively below. There has been no buying from officers or directors on record in 2026.
The next earnings event is confirmed for June 4. With short interest at a new high, availability exhausted, and guidance suspended, the setup into that print is less about what the quarterly numbers show and more about whether management can provide any visibility that justifies re-rating above the current $6 floor.
See the live data behind this article on ORTEX.
Open LCID 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.
