Wolfspeed has crossed a threshold that few stocks ever reach: short interest now exceeds the entire freely tradable float, borrow costs have multiplied fivefold in a week, and the stock has still gained 10% on the week.
Since the last ORTEX notes on May 13–14 — when short interest was at 74–86% of float and cost to borrow was running at 3.87–6.52% — both metrics have accelerated sharply. Short interest has climbed to 103.3% of free float, up 32% in five trading sessions. Estimated short shares rose from around 20.3 million on May 11 to 26.8 million by May 19. That is not a rounding error: bears added roughly 6.5 million shares in four days, even as the price moved against them.
The lending market is as tight as it gets. Availability has been at 0% for the majority of sessions since late April — meaning every share in the lending pool is currently lent out. This is the tightest reading of the past year, with no material improvement in sight. Cost to borrow has responded accordingly: it was below 2% for most of April, hit 6.5% on May 13, and now runs at 15.1% APR. That is a near-fivefold increase in one week and an extraordinary 762% above the one-month-ago level. Any short seller building a position at these rates is paying a steep carry on a trade that has already moved against them by 130% over the past month.
Options positioning has grown more cautious as the stock rallied, though it remains far from extreme. The put/call ratio is 0.78, modestly above its 20-day average of 0.69 — a z-score of just 0.64. The 52-week high on the PCR is 0.98, hit on May 6 during the sharpest leg of the rally. Options traders are hedging at a slightly elevated rate, but there is no panic buying of puts. The ORTEX short score has climbed steadily all week, reaching 80.7 on May 19 — up from 75.3 on May 8 and now firmly in extreme territory.
The institutional picture adds another layer of complexity. Renesas Electronics holds 37.4% of shares, a strategic stake it has not changed. Slate Path Capital entered a fresh position of 4.4 million shares as of March 31, and Allianz Asset Management built a near-new 1.4 million share position in the same period. Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs also increased holdings materially in Q1. With Renesas' strategic block largely immovable and several other institutional buyers freshly established, the available float for both longs and shorts is structurally constrained — which is part of why short interest as a percentage of float can exceed 100%. The CEO sold $1.1 million worth of stock on May 1 at $36.76; the stock has since gained more than 60% from that level.
Analyst targets remain well below the current price. The consensus mean target was $40 as of early May — against a current price of $58.83. The most recent changes on record are from Piper Sandler and Susquehanna in January and February 2026, both with targets in the $20 range. Given the stock has since more than doubled, those targets are significantly stale and likely under active revision. The ORTEX short score rank of 1st percentile signals this is among the most extreme short-positioning situations in the entire universe.
The most recent earnings print, on May 5, delivered a 20% one-day gain and a 49% five-day gain. The next event is not until August 20. The period between now and that date is the one to watch: with short interest above 100% of float, zero availability, and borrow costs climbing past 15%, the arithmetic of carrying a short position here becomes increasingly punishing with each passing week.
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