PBF Energy is under fresh pressure this week, down 10.5% to $38.26 — a move that combines a sector-wide refining retreat with the lingering overhang of Carlos Slim's ongoing exit from his anchor position.
The sector context matters here. The whole refining complex sold off sharply: VLO fell 6.6% on the week, CVI dropped 8.3%, and DK shed 5.9%. PBF's 10.5% decline ran hotter than most of its peers, which points to stock-specific pressure layered on top of the macro move. The stock gave back roughly two-thirds of its April-to-May rally in a single week.
The Slim overhang hasn't gone away. As reported last week, Control Empresarial de Capitales — Slim's vehicle — sold roughly 785,000 shares between late April and May 5 at prices between $41 and $46, generating around $34.9 million in proceeds. The most recent filings leave him still the largest shareholder at 15.6% of shares outstanding. With the stock now trading near $38, well below those sale prices, the question for the register is whether the selling pace continues or pauses at these lower levels. The net insider position over 90 days is a positive $74.2 million, but that figure is dominated by Slim's prior accumulation — the directional flow this month has been firmly out.
Options traders have grown noticeably more defensive over the past week. The put/call ratio climbed to 0.61, roughly 1.5 standard deviations above its 20-day average of 0.42 — a meaningful shift from the call-heavy positioning that dominated through early May, when the PCR was consistently below 0.33. Borrow conditions tell a different story. Availability is exceptionally loose, running at over 3,500% — meaning the pool of lendable shares dwarfs current short interest by a wide margin. Cost to borrow is negligible at 0.50% annualised. Short interest itself has continued to drift lower, easing another 3% on the week to 9.8% of the free float, after peaking near 13.3 million shares in mid-April. The divergence is notable: options players are hedging more aggressively, while short sellers are not pressing the trade.
The Street remains cautious but is nudging targets higher. Mizuho raised its price target today to $48 from $43 while keeping a Neutral rating — the stock currently trades 21% below that revised target. Citi similarly lifted its target to $43 earlier this month. Against that, Morgan Stanley holds an Underweight with a $34 target and TD Cowen has a Sell at $36. The consensus mean sits at $43.33, implying roughly 13% upside from current levels — but the distribution of ratings is clustered around neutral-to-negative. Valuation has compressed sharply with the price: the P/E is now at 6.3x and EV/EBITDA at 3.7x, both down meaningfully over the past 30 days. The earnings yield of 15.8% reflects just how cheaply the market is pricing the stock relative to trailing earnings. Factor scores add nuance — EPS momentum over 90 days ranks in the 99th percentile, but the EPS surprise score at just 9 signals the company has been missing estimates when it counts.
Last week's Q1 earnings release on April 30 left the stock essentially flat on the day but down nearly 6% over the five sessions that followed — a pattern consistent with results that failed to excite. The ORTEX short score has eased from 54.9 on May 14 to 48.8 now, tracking the decline in short interest rather than any new pressure building.
What to watch: whether the Slim selling programme resumes at sub-$40 prices, and whether the options market's defensive tilt feeds through into actual short interest rebuilding — because right now those two signals are pointing in opposite directions.
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