Intuitive Machines has just reported — and the post-earnings picture looks meaningfully different from the pre-print setup that dominated four straight notes.
The June 4 earnings event arrived with the stock at $39.57, up 13.5% on the week and 54% over the past month. Prior notes tracked an escalating bear case: availability collapsing to near zero, a put/call ratio at 52-week highs, and short interest holding stubbornly at 27% of float. Some of that pressure has started to unwind. Not all of it.
The clearest change is in options sentiment. The PCR has pulled back sharply — from the 0.70 extreme flagged on June 2 to 0.41 now, just modestly above its 20-day mean of 0.38. That is still slightly elevated at 1.1 standard deviations above average, but it is a world away from the four-sigma defensive spike that preceded the print. Traders who had loaded up on puts into earnings have unwound a significant portion of that hedge.
Short positioning tells a more complicated story. Short interest dipped slightly on the day — down 2.1% to 32.2 million shares — but remains at 27% of float, essentially unchanged from the structural level that has persisted for weeks. Bears have not covered in any meaningful way. What has shifted is availability: it has loosened from the near-zero reading of 2% on June 1 back to 6.9% now. That is still very tight — roughly one share available for every fourteen already borrowed — but the acute squeeze pressure of last week has partially eased. The cost to borrow has settled at 1.15%, up 20% over the week in absolute terms but below the brief spike to 1.56% seen on June 1.
The Street's reaction to the print reinforces a bifurcated picture. Analysts had already raced to raise targets in the run-up: Roth Capital's Suji Desilva lifted his target to $75 on May 28 — a 50% jump in a single week — while Cantor Fitzgerald moved to $43 and Canaccord Genuity to $41. The mean target now sits at $40.78, which places the current price of $39.57 roughly in line with consensus. Strip out Roth's outlier $75 target and LUNR is trading at or above most sell-side views. The bull case rests on Q4 gross profit hitting $8.5 million — up 1,150% year-on-year — and the strategic rationale of the Lanteris acquisition expanding manufacturing capacity. Bears point to a still-substantial EBITDA loss, limited operating history, and execution risk in an emerging market with intensifying competition.
Founder and Chairman Kamal Ghaffarian sold roughly $7 million of stock across multiple tranches in May — at prices ranging from $25 to $38 — as the rally accelerated. That selling continued into the June earnings window. He retains a 2.25% stake per the latest filing, but the consistent pattern of selling into strength remains notable context. On the institutional side, State Street added 1.85 million shares in Q1, and Citadel initiated a position of 3.6 million shares in the same period — offsetting, to some degree, the founder's ongoing trim.
The earnings reaction history adds a useful frame. The most recent print on May 14 produced a 5% one-day decline and a 4% five-day loss. The print before that delivered a 10.8% gain on day one and a 15.9% five-day move. The range of outcomes is wide. With the stock now sitting just above the analyst consensus, short interest still at 27%, and availability only modestly recovered from last week's near-zero extreme, the key question heading into the next few sessions is whether the June 4 print delivers enough fundamental surprise to either force short covering at scale or hand bears the catalyst they have been positioning for.
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