TD SYNNEX heads into the final days of May with a notable split: the Street's most bullish action in months arrived today, while short sellers have been quietly rebuilding positions throughout the rally.
JP Morgan made the decisive move. This morning, analyst Joseph Cardoso upgraded SNX to Overweight from Neutral, announcing a $298 price target — the highest on the Street. That's a clean break from his own prior posture; Cardoso had held at Neutral with a $220 target as recently as mid-April, before lifting to $185 a week earlier following the March earnings print. The upgrade follows a string of target increases from other bellwether names: Morgan Stanley's Erik Woodring raised to $271 in late April, and UBS's David Vogt lifted to $265 at the start of May. The consensus is a clear buy. Four analysts carry outperform-equivalent ratings against one hold, with a mean target of around $241 — closely matching the $240 close — and JP Morgan's new $298 now standing well above the pack.
The week's price action supports the optimism. SNX gained 6% over the past five sessions to close at $240, extending a 5% rise over the trailing month. Peer distributor JBL was the week's standout, up 12.3%, while and added 7.3% and 6.9% respectively. and each rose roughly 5.4%. SNX kept pace with its closest correlated peers — not leading the group, but firmly participating in a broad sector move higher.
Short interest tells a more cautious sub-plot. Shorts have climbed 29% over the past month to roughly 1.95% of the free float — still a low absolute level, but the direction of travel is notable. The build accelerated in the second half of May; short shares jumped 11% over the week alone. Cost to borrow, while cheap at 0.48%, rose 35% over the same period — a signal that demand for borrows has picked up, even if the borrow market remains extremely loose. Availability is essentially unlimited at roughly 6,200% of short interest, meaning there is no constraint on new short positioning whatsoever. Options traders are moving the other way: the put/call ratio dropped to 0.24, well below its 20-day average of 0.32 and close to its 52-week low of 0.15. Call activity is dominating, consistent with the post-upgrade sentiment.
Inside the company, two insiders were sellers in May. Director Richard T. Hume sold roughly 5,000 shares across multiple tranches on May 18, realising close to $1.1m in total. Executive Director Dennis Polk sold 2,500 shares on May 15 for just under $576k. The sales are small relative to the company's size and carry low significance scores, but the pattern — insiders trimming into a rising price — is worth noting alongside the rising short count. The 90-day net insider figure remains positive at 35,665 shares, meaning earlier purchases still outweigh recent sales over the broader window.
The earnings backdrop reinforces why the analyst community has warmed to SNX. After Q1 results on March 31, the stock jumped 16% on the day and extended to a 22% gain over the following five sessions — the sharpest post-print reaction in the recent history. Revenue grew 8% year-over-year, driven by cloud infrastructure and AI-related demand. The factor scores add colour: EPS surprise ranks in the 78th percentile, and 90-day EPS momentum is in the 70th percentile, reflecting a consistent beat-and-raise cadence. The 12-month forward EPS growth estimate, however, ranks in only the 25th percentile — the bear case rests on exactly this, with bears pointing to thin distribution margins and cyclical PC-market risk constraining long-term earnings expansion.
With no confirmed next earnings event in the snapshot, the near-term story is one of digest: whether buyers continue absorbing the JP Morgan upgrade into a stock where short sellers have been growing louder, and where insiders are taking some chips off the table near a 52-week high.
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