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Luke Kawa2/12/26

Options trades to play for a short squeeze in Hims & Hers as the pain piles up

Hims & Hers has been clobbered over the past week as the telehealth company stepped back from plans to sell a copycat version of Novo Nordisk’s weight-loss pill and then faced a lawsuit from the Danish pharma titan.

In these troubled times for the company, the haters are out in full force.

“HIMS is down -48% over the last month, and yet short interest continues to increase (and accelerate), suggesting hedge funds are pressing their shorts, even though shares are approaching 2Y lows (RSI is just 15),” wrote Dean Curnutt, CEO of Macro Risk Advisors. “With earnings on 2/23, this potentially sets up for a nasty short covering/squeeze event, especially since HIMS usually sees strong post-earnings follow-through.”

HIMS SI — (Macro Risk Advisors)

Should some be tempted to catch a falling knife in the once loved stock, he offers a pair of risk-defined ways to do so via call spreads.

Curnutt’s recommendations:

Buy calls on Hims with a strike price of $20 that expire on March 20; sell same amount of $30 strike calls with the same expiry.
Buy calls on Hims with a strike price of $22 that expire on March 20; sell same amount of $28 strike calls with the same expiry.

“There is also a lot of upside call skew in Mar expiry, and this allows us to set up call spreads with extremely attractive breakevens and payouts,” Curnutt wrote.

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What Wall Street’s saying about Nvidia’s Q1 results

A makeover beautifies the growth outlook; so does the CPU opportunity.

Jensen Huang in front of Vera Rubin at CES 2026

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SoftBank rallies on OpenAI and SB Energy IPO plans; its Japanese-traded stock notches best day since 2000

SoftBank shares skyrocketed in Tokyo trading, notching their biggest daily gain since 2000, boosted by news about planned IPOs at OpenAI, in which SoftBank has a sizable stake, and SoftBank’s own SB Energy unit. ADRs of SoftBank traded in the US rallied, too.

OpenAI is accelerating the timeline to its public debut, preparing to confidentially file its IPO prospectus with regulators as early as Friday, according to The Wall Street Journal. That could set the stage for a highly anticipated public listing as early as September.

SoftBank has systematically expanded its financial exposure to OpenAI, securing a highly valuable stake in the company. As of the fiscal year-end, SoftBank’s cumulative investment in OpenAI totaled $34.6 billion, with a fair value of $79.6 billion, and cumulative investment gains totaled $45 billion, according to a SoftBank filing.

For SoftBank, a successful public debut is critical to demonstrating that OpenAI can protect its market position amid intense industry pressure. Investors have grown increasingly anxious that OpenAI is losing ground to competitors like Anthropic, which is currently in talks for a funding round that could push its own valuation past that of OpenAI.

Adding to the upward momentum, SB Energy, the digital infrastructure and clean energy development firm co-owned by SoftBank and Ares Management, confirmed its own confidential draft registration filing for a major US public listing.

This multipronged IPO pipeline has boosted investors’ confidence in billionaire founder Masayoshi Son’s high-conviction AI thesis, showcasing a road map for SoftBank to transition its paper gains into potential liquidity. SoftBank’s stock is up 37% so far this year.

Maybe we should all agree to not talk about Nvidia’s stock after earnings

It’s probably making people dumber.

Nvidia conference with Jensen Huang

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Max Knoblauch6h

Nio posts better-than-expected first-quarter earnings and forecasts strong Q2 sales

Chinese EV maker Nio posted Q1 results before markets opened on Thursday, reporting earnings that beat expectations and strong sales guidance for the second quarter. Shares of the company climbed more than 4% in premarket trading.

For the first quarter, Nio reported:

Adjusted earnings of $0.00 per share, compared to the $0.05 loss per share that Wall Street analysts polled by FactSet had expected.
$3.7 billion in revenue, compared to the $3.74 billion consensus estimate.
83,465 vehicle deliveries, slightly exceeding its own forecast of between 80,000 and 83,000.

For Q2, Nio guided for deliveries of between 110,000 and 115,000, compared to estimates of 113,807. The company expects second-quarter revenues to come in between $4.75 billion and $4.99 billion, while analysts are forecasting $4.6 billion.

The Chinese auto industry has seen a surge in exports so far this year, as companies make efforts to combat declining domestic sales. Nio, which is still relatively new to overseas operations, has plans to ship “several thousand” EVs overseas this year.

J. Edward Moreno

Walmart gives disappointing Q2 guidance, warns about stress among low-income consumers

The retailer reported earnings before the bell on Thursday.

Walmart Store

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