Capricor Therapeutics enters the post-earnings stretch under genuine pressure: short sellers have rebuilt positions aggressively after the May 12 quarterly print, insiders sold into strength, and borrow availability has tightened sharply — all at once.
The most compelling tension in the data right now is the widening gap between a rising short position and a loosening borrow market that could flip quickly. Short interest has climbed to 24.5% of the free float, up from around 20% a month ago and roughly 15% at the start of April. That acceleration — 8% growth in a single week and 23% over the past month — puts CAPR among the more heavily shorted small-cap biotechs in the US universe, with a short score of 73.7 ranking in just the 7th percentile of the market. The official FINRA data, which settled through April 30, already showed 10.5 million shares short. Borrow conditions tell a nuanced story: the cost to borrow is a negligible 0.56% annualised, meaning bears face almost no carrying cost on their positions. Availability has fallen hard this week though — from around 435% in early May to 196% now — as new short demand absorbs lendable supply. The 52-week low availability on record is essentially zero, suggesting the stock can get far tighter than it is today if the trend continues. Days to cover has compressed to just 3.1, down from the official reading of 12.7 as of end-April, indicating volume has risen sharply since that settlement date.
Options positioning is only mildly cautious, which makes an interesting counterpoint to the aggressive short-side activity. The put/call ratio is running at 0.425, just above its 20-day average of 0.40 and roughly 0.8 standard deviations above that mean. That is well within normal range and sits toward the lower end of the 52-week band, whose peak hit 3.16 during a period of much heavier defensive activity. In other words, options traders are not piling into downside protection — the pressure on the stock is coming from outright short positions rather than hedged put-buying.
The catalyst behind the short rebuild appears to be the May 12 earnings release. The stock fell nearly 5% on the day and extended those losses to around 16% over the following five sessions — a significant reaction for a pre-revenue biotech. CFO Anthony Bergmann sold 25,000 shares at roughly $31.70 on May 1, days before the print, joining the General Counsel in a simultaneous sale of the same size. Both executives also sold in late March. The net insider position over the past 90 days shows 222,529 shares in aggregate sold, worth approximately $6.8 million. That pattern of recurring executive sales at prices materially above where the stock is now trading ($26.92 as of May 19, down 15% on the week and 22% over the month) is consistent with insiders managing their own exit risk ahead of the catalyst.
On the institutional side, the ownership base is more encouraging for bulls. Suvretta Capital — a dedicated healthcare long/short fund — added 2.9 million shares in Q1 2026 to reach a 6.6% stake. Tang Capital built a 5.9% position, also adding 1.7 million shares in the same period. BlackRock and State Street both added meaningfully in their most recent filings. These are not passive-only names; Suvretta and Tang in particular are specialist biotech investors whose additions represent genuine conviction. The largest single holder remains Nippon Shinyaku with 8.5%, though that relationship is complicated by the ongoing litigation over deramiocel's commercialization terms. Their stake has been unchanged since at least March 2025.
Peer context reinforces the stock's isolated difficulty. Closest correlated names VERA and KROS fell 9.4% and 14.9% respectively on the week — so the sector environment is clearly challenging. But CAPR's 14.6% weekly decline matches the weakest in its peer cluster, and the short-score divergence from names like PRAX (which fell just 6.6%) suggests the incremental pressure on CAPR is specific rather than purely macro.
The next scheduled earnings event is August 6. Between now and then, the story is essentially whether the institutional buyers adding in Q1 at much lower prices hold conviction at current levels, or whether the accelerating short position and executive selling push availability to the tighter end of its historical range — the point at which carrying cost becomes a real conversation.
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