JETS has posted its best week in months — up 14% — and for the first time since the squeeze episode began, the positioning data is moving in the same direction as the price.
Short interest has fallen again. At 43.7% of free float, it remains extraordinarily high by any standard. But the direction matters: short shares dropped from roughly 12.9 million on May 19 to 12.0 million by May 26, a 7% decline over the week. That continues the broader unwind from the mid-May peak of 16.6 million shares, when bears were maximally positioned. Two consecutive weeks of covering now leave short interest at its lowest level in six weeks — still crowded, but measurably less so than it was.
The borrow market has loosened in step. Availability has climbed back to 53.2% — roughly one share available for every two already lent out — a sharp recovery from last week's near-zero readings, when availability briefly touched 5.9% on May 19. Cost to borrow has eased alongside that, pulling back to 6.8% APR from over 8% earlier in the month. The borrow market is no longer in crisis mode. It is back to the range it occupied in late April, which was tight but manageable. Bears who held through the squeeze are paying less to stay in the trade than they were a week ago.
Options have completed a dramatic shift that was already underway when the last note published. The put/call ratio has fallen to 2.08 — the lowest reading in the entire 30-day history shown, and more than two standard deviations below the 20-day mean of 3.16. For most of April and the first half of May, the PCR sat stubbornly above 3.0, reflecting persistent demand for downside protection. That regime has reversed sharply. Call buyers now dominate flow at a level not seen in this data set. The 52-week high on the PCR was 3.81 just two weeks ago on May 14; the current reading is the mirror image of that defensive peak.
What has changed since the previous notes is that the three signals — price, positioning, and options — are now aligned rather than contradictory. The earlier "squeeze paradox" described a situation where short interest fell but borrow tightened and the cost to borrow rose. That divergence has resolved. Short interest is lower, borrow is looser, and options traders have abandoned the hedging posture they held for weeks. The ORTEX short score remains elevated at 71.9, edging down from 72.9 a fortnight ago — a reading consistent with continued bearish structural positioning, even as the acute pressure has eased. Bears are still in the trade. They are simply less squeezed than they were.
The question the data now poses is whether the covering wave has further to run, or whether shorts at 43.7% of float represent a floor. Availability at 53% leaves room for new short positions to be established — unlike two weeks ago, the borrow market is not a barrier. What to watch is whether short interest stabilises at current levels or continues its decline toward the 11–12 million share range last seen in mid-April, and whether the PCR, now at a 30-day low, holds below 2.5 or mean-reverts as call buyers take profits on the week's gains.
See the live data behind this article on ORTEX.
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