VNET Group heads into its May 20 earnings print with a striking split between persistently high short positioning and increasingly bullish options sentiment.
Short interest is the dominant feature of the setup. At 13.2% of free float, with roughly 35.5 million shares sold short, the bearish bet against VNET is substantial — ranking in just the 5th percentile of the universe by short score rank, meaning it is more heavily shorted than 95% of peers. The ORTEX short score of 71.3 has held stubbornly in a tight range around 70 for most of May, signalling no meaningful capitulation from bears despite the stock's 12% rally over the past week. Days to cover run nearly 6.8 days on official data, adding a mechanical squeeze risk if the print forces short-covering. Borrow costs remain low at 0.84% APR — shorts are not being squeezed out of their positions by financing pressure. Availability has tightened sharply in the past week, dropping from roughly 180% to 107%, though that still leaves the lending pool reasonably supplied.
Options traders tell a different story. Positioning has shifted decisively toward calls ahead of the event, with the put/call ratio falling to 0.31 — well below its 20-day average of 0.43 and sitting near the lower end of the past year's range. That is more than one standard deviation below the recent mean, pointing to unusual appetite for upside exposure rather than hedging. The divergence is notable: while short sellers have maintained their bets, options flow has rotated meaningfully bullish over the past two weeks. The stock's 12% weekly gain ahead of the print may partly reflect that rotation, but the two camps are clearly not aligned.
The bull case rests on a powerful momentum story. The ORTEX stock score climbed to 73 from 68.5 a month ago, driven by a momentum sub-score of 86.5. EPS surprise ranks in the 100th percentile of the universe — VNET has consistently beaten estimates — and 30-day and 90-day forward EPS momentum score in the 85th and 82nd percentiles respectively. That combination gives bulls reason to expect another beat. Quality is the obvious counterweight: the quality pillar scores just 29, weighed down by thin return metrics and a stretched trailing P/E near 77x. The 5.9 billion dollar enterprise value against an EV/EBITDA of 10.8x is less demanding, but the balance sheet quality concern is the nub of the bear case.
Historical price reactions sharpen the stakes. After the March 2026 results, VNET fell 11.2% on the day and extended losses to 14.7% over the following five sessions. A comparable print the prior period produced a 5.9% single-day drop and a 15.7% five-day decline. Both prior earnings events produced sustained selling, not just a quick gap. Institutional flows add one more layer: Goldman Sachs added 4.4 million shares in Q1, while Point72 built a 4.4 million share position — both meaningful new buyers. Morgan Stanley trimmed by 3.3 million shares over the same period. The ownership table is therefore mixed, with smart-money buyers and sellers roughly offsetting each other into the print.
The earnings report is therefore less about headline revenue and more about whether VNET can show margin progress credible enough to close the gap between the 0.31 put/call ratio's implied optimism and a short interest that has refused to budge.
See the live data behind this article on ORTEX.
Open VNET 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.
