AST SpaceMobile heads into its June 12 earnings call at $107.73 — down 17% on the week and back to levels last seen just before the SpaceX-halo rally peaked near $133.
The short side has continued its retreat, but only modestly. Short interest has eased to 18.0% of the free float from a mid-May peak above 21%, and it has fallen 6% in share terms over the past week alone. That is the continuation of a trend flagged in last week's note — shorts are losing some conviction, but 18% is still a high absolute level for a stock that just sold off 17%. Borrow cost remains remarkably cheap at 0.75%, barely changed over the past month. Availability is tight at around 41% — for every two shares already borrowed, roughly one remains available — which is tighter than the recent average but well above this year's low of 12%. The ORTEX short score of 69 has barely moved in two weeks, which is consistent with a market still skeptical but not aggressively adding. The options market offers the clearest signal of cautious recalibration: the put/call ratio has climbed to 0.44, above its 20-day average of 0.41, though barely above one standard deviation from that mean. That is a mild shift toward hedging — not a panic — and the PCR is still near the lower half of its 52-week range of 0.32 to 0.70.
The Street is not rushing to upgrade into the weakness. The most recent action came from Deutsche Bank's Bryan Kraft on May 29, who downgraded from Buy to Hold and cut his target to $106 — a move that landed the same day as a 15% single-session selloff and now sits just below Wednesday's close. UBS trimmed its neutral-rated target from $85 to $80 in May. The consensus mean target of $82 is materially below the current price, a gap that is unusual and worth flagging — it implies the Street, in aggregate, sees the stock as overvalued at current levels even after this week's decline. Barclays holds an Underweight with a $65 target. The bull case rests on the patent-protected direct-to-device architecture, a roster of MNO partners, and a 200%-plus revenue growth rate that recently pushed the ORTEX growth score to its highest level in six months. The bear case is capital intensity, persistent operating losses, and Starlink's head start — structural concerns that weekly moves don't resolve.
The institutional picture adds texture. Rakuten cut its position sharply, shedding over 15 million shares in its last reported filing, making it a net seller of scale. BlackRock and State Street both added in April. The more notable holders are the strategic ones: Alphabet holds nearly 3% and AT&T just over 2%, both unchanged in recent filings, reflecting the importance of MNO and tech-platform relationships to the ASTS thesis. On the insider side, the May 29 selloff coincided with coordinated selling by the CEO, CFO, COO, and President — all selling at $113.41 on the same day, totalling roughly $10 million in combined proceeds. The pattern follows additional selling by the President and COO earlier in May. Net insider activity over 90 days is technically positive in share terms due to a large COO award, but the cash sales across the C-suite have been consistent and worth noting as context ahead of the earnings release.
The earnings history is limited but instructive. The most recent print, in May 2026, produced a one-day decline of 2.8% followed by a five-day gain of nearly 16%. The prior event, in March 2026, delivered a 21% one-day jump. Two data points is too thin for a reliable pattern, but both outcomes produced significant moves in opposite directions on the day, suggesting the market treats each ASTS print as a genuine information event rather than a confirmation of the trend. With the stock down 17% in a week heading into the June 12 call, the setup going in looks quite different from the high-momentum environment that preceded the May print.
The next session to watch is June 12, where the size of the recent drawdown, the direction of short covering, and whether the C-suite sales signal anything about guidance will all be in focus simultaneously.
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