Relmada Therapeutics enters June on the back foot, down 16% in a month after a sharp re-rating higher — and fresh dilution news is the clearest explanation for why the momentum has stalled.
The most consequential recent development is structural rather than clinical. On May 27, shareholders approved an increase in authorized common stock from 150 million to 200 million shares. That followed a public offering announced in mid-May, which itself triggered a 9.9% single-session drop. The combination of a capital raise and a ceiling lift on share count arriving together tells investors that more dilution is a live possibility — even as the stock sits well above where insiders bought in size just six months ago. The stock closed Tuesday at $6.42, down 6.3% on the day and 10.5% over the past week.
Short interest at 7.4% of free float is elevated enough to matter but has been surprisingly stable. The FINRA-reported figure of 5.49 million shares is nearly unchanged from a month ago, and ORTEX's daily estimate shows only a 0.6% week-on-week uptick. That flat-to-modest trend suggests shorts have not been aggressively adding into the decline — they accumulated earlier, around the May offering, and appear to be holding rather than pressing. Days to cover of 6.1 reinforces that the position is meaningful relative to trading volume. The lending market has been the more volatile signal: cost to borrow spiked to 2.1% in mid-May before collapsing back to around 0.4% through late May, then re-accelerated to 1.0% by June 2 — an 87% week-on-week increase that reflects episodic demand for borrows rather than a structural squeeze. Availability remains extraordinarily loose at over 5,000%, meaning there is no lending constraint on new short positions. The borrow pressure appears to be coming in waves, tied to specific trading activity rather than a persistent crowding dynamic.
Options positioning is almost entirely call-skewed, which stands in sharp contrast to the declining price action. The put/call ratio of 0.085 is just barely above its 20-day mean of 0.078 — nearly flat relative to history — and sits far below the 52-week high of 0.52. Options traders are not hedging. That either reflects confidence in a recovery or, more likely, reflects the simple reality that call open interest on a clinical-stage name at these prices tends to be speculative rather than protective. The ORTEX short score of 41.4 is squarely mid-range and has barely moved over the past two weeks.
The Street's enthusiasm peaked around the March earnings print. Mizuho raised its target from $10 to $19 (maintaining Outperform) on March 20, and Piper Sandler initiated at Overweight with a $12 target four days later. Both moves are now more than 10 weeks old. The consensus mean target of $13 implies roughly 100% upside to Tuesday's close — but that math is distorted by the Mizuho $19 print, which now looks optimistic against a stock that has given back all the post-March gains and then some. The most recent analyst data is from late March, so the current consensus does not yet reflect the May dilution events. A $8 Leerink Outperform initiation from January and a $9 Jefferies Buy from December 2025 — both now stale — are directionally constructive but far from current. Investors attending the upcoming Jefferies Global Healthcare Conference presentation will be watching whether management addresses the capital structure narrative directly.
Institutional ownership tells a constructive structural story. Janus Henderson holds 10.5% and added 3.8 million shares in Q1. RA Capital built a new position of 2.9 million shares. VR Management initiated with 4.8 million shares — also a new position. Specialist healthcare managers like OrbiMed and Adage also added. The Q1 13-F wave reads as genuine conviction buying ahead of what these managers presumably saw as a catalyst-rich second half. Insiders were similarly active: the CFO and CEO both bought in November 2025 at $2.20 and again in December at $4.12. Those purchases are now 170 days old, outside the freshness window, but worth noting given the price has held well above those levels even after the recent slide. No insider selling is visible in the record.
The next scheduled earnings event is August 7. That date is also the next hard look at where the authorized share increase and any follow-on capital activity leaves the float — a number that investors will be recalibrating between now and then.
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