HF Sinclair enters the week with an unusually clear bullish signal from within: chairman and interim CEO Franklin Myers bought $1.04 million of stock on May 18 at $69.11. The purchase stands out because Myers is a relatively new occupant of the top seat, and backing a bet with seven figures of personal capital is a hard signal to dismiss.
The insider angle is the clearest read on the stock right now. Myers bought 15,000 shares, lifting the company's 90-day net insider position to a net purchase of 25,000 shares worth roughly $1.73 million. Against that, an EVP sold $690,500 of stock on May 15, a routine divestiture that doesn't materially change the directional read. The dominant recent flow is buying, not selling — and it comes from the top.
Analyst activity reinforces the tone. The Street has spent much of the past few weeks raising targets rather than cutting. UBS lifted its target from $65 to $80, maintaining Buy. TD Cowen moved from $68 to $80, holding its Hold rating. Barclays raised to $71 from $61. Morgan Stanley nudged to $66 from $57. The direction is broadly upward across bulls and cautious holders alike — the mean target now sits at $73.29, close to the current $71.82 price. Valuation multiples are undemanding: the stock trades at under 10x trailing earnings and an EV/EBITDA of roughly 5.5x. The bear case centres on internal governance questions — the ongoing investigation and Myers's limited transparency — but the bull case anchors on strong refining margins and renewable diesel exposure.
Positioning in the lending market is emphatically loose. Availability runs at over 4,000% of short interest, meaning shares to borrow dwarf the amount currently borrowed — one of the most uncrowded borrow situations in the sector. Cost to borrow has fallen sharply, down 38% week-on-week to just 0.28%, a multi-month low. Short interest sits at only 3.4% of the free float, and has drifted about 5% lower on the week. Nothing in the borrow market reflects any particular conviction from the short side.
Options positioning has moved in a more defensive direction. The put/call ratio is running at 0.92, roughly 1.25 standard deviations above its 20-day average of 0.77. That's not extreme — the 52-week high for this ratio is 1.47 — but it marks a clear shift from April's more optimistic skew, when the PCR was sitting in the low 0.60s. The move coincides with a strong one-month price run of nearly 26%, which tends to attract hedging. The short score sits at 34.5, well below any level that would suggest mounting bearish conviction.
The refining peer group had a mixed week. VLO gained 6.3% and MPC rose 4.4%, outpacing DINO's 0.7% weekly gain. DK slipped 1.2% while PARR fell 2.3%. DINO's more muted weekly move comes after the sharpest monthly appreciation in the group — it is up 25.7% in a month, versus VLO's 6.3% and MPC's 4.4%. The next earnings release is scheduled for August 6, the next point at which guidance and margin commentary will either validate or test the recent re-rating.
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