BlackRock TCP Capital Corp. heads into its May 27 earnings call with shorts actively unwinding, insiders having bought aggressively into weakness, and options positioning suggesting renewed caution — three signals that don't quite tell the same story.
The clearest shift this week is in short positioning. Shorts have pulled back meaningfully, with estimated short shares falling roughly 8.5% over the past week to around 5.44 million. That brings short interest to approximately 6.5% of the free float — still elevated for a BDC, but down from the ~7% range that prevailed through late April and early May. The ORTEX short score has eased to 64.9 from a recent high near 66.8, reinforcing the picture of incremental covering rather than fresh conviction. Days to cover stood at 8.8 on the latest FINRA settlement data — a meaningful buffer that makes any rapid exit difficult if sentiment turns.
The borrow market has loosened alongside. Cost to borrow has fallen 15.5% this week to 3.75% APR, and is down nearly 23% over the past month — a sustained easing that reflects reduced demand for borrows rather than a sudden supply spike. Borrow availability is materially tighter than a year ago but not at crisis levels; around 27% of the lending pool remains available against current short interest. Options tell a different tale. The put/call ratio has climbed to 0.86, running more than two standard deviations above its 20-day mean of 0.79 — the highest z-score reading in the current data window at 2.27. That kind of defensive skew, building in the week before a scheduled earnings event on May 27, suggests options traders are hedging more actively than usual even as equity shorts reduce exposure.
The Street's view has grown progressively more negative over the past year, and the most recent analyst actions — both in early March 2026 — crystallise that direction. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods downgraded TCPC to Underperform and cut the price target from $7.00 to $3.50. Wells Fargo, already at Underweight, trimmed its target from $5.50 to $3.50. Both now sit below the current price of $4.15, implying the firm consensus is that the stock is overvalued on their models. The P/B multiple of 0.63x is already a steep discount to net asset value, and the earnings yield near 18% reflects the market's scepticism about portfolio quality and future distribution sustainability — the historical dividend data is too stale to draw conclusions, but that yield level is a signal worth noting.
Insider behaviour runs counter to the analyst caution. In early March, multiple executives — including the president, the CFO, and a chief-level officer — bought shares in the $3.65–$3.89 range. The net 90-day insider position was a purchase of roughly 121,000 shares worth approximately $493,000. These were small-dollar transactions individually, but the coordinated timing across C-suite roles near what appears to have been a recent trough gives the signal more weight than any single trade would on its own. The stock has since recovered to $4.15, so those buyers are modestly in the money heading into the next print.
The last earnings event, on May 7, produced a 3.9% single-day decline and a 1.8% loss over the subsequent week. With the May 27 print now less than two weeks away, options positioning has already begun to reflect that history. What to watch is whether the short covering seen this week continues into the event or reverses — a rebuild in short interest alongside rising put demand would mark a notably more charged setup than the one in place today.
See the live data behind this article on ORTEX.
Open TCPC 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.
