MFG availability has swung from 300% to 30% in five weeks. That compression tells the more important story here — not the falling short interest.
In late April, Mizuho Financial Group had availability of over 300%. Lenders held roughly three shares available for every one already borrowed. By May 27, that number had crashed to 17%. Availability briefly touched 14% — fewer than one share available per six borrowed — before recovering to 30% as of June 2.
The most acute squeeze ran from May 26 to June 1. Availability hit its current 52-week low of 2.69% during that window. That's an almost completely exhausted lending pool.
Short interest dropped 43.8% over the past week to approximately 4.27 million shares. That looks like shorts covering. But the borrow market tells a different story.
Cost to borrow jumped 71.7% in one week to 1.25% APR. Availability remains tight at 30%. When shorts cover availability tightens simultaneously, it usually means something else is consuming the lending pool — institutional hedging, collateral demand, or repositioning by large holders.
Nomura Asset Management added nearly 9.8 million shares in its last reported period. Capital Research added 4.6 million. Both could be drawing on the same lending inventory that short sellers use.
The put/call ratio sits at 0.70, up sharply from a 20-day mean of 0.56. The PCR z-score is approximately 1.0 — elevated but not extreme. For context, the 52-week high PCR is 1.28 and the low is 0.07. The options market has shifted more defensive since mid-May, coinciding with the availability squeeze.
Availability recovered from 14% to 30% in two days. Whether that stabilises or reverses will determine the borrow cost trajectory. Mizuho next reports earnings July 31. The last print on May 15 moved the stock -5.3% on the day.
Data summary
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