The company lifted its full-year and fourth-quarter forecast
The shares of Signet Jewelers Ltd. (NYSE:SIG) are up 3.7% to trade at $90.65 this morning, following news that the company lifted its fourth-quarter, full-year revenue, and same-store sales growth forecasts. The diamond retailer reported preliminary holiday sales that rose 30.4% year-over-year, while its same-store sales rose 25.2% in that time period. Separately, Signet announced a $500 million expansion to its existing share buyback program.
Today's pop has SIG set to snap a three-day losing streak. While the stock saw a sharp pullback from its Nov. 22, five-year high of $111.92, it found its footing at the 150-day moving average. Plus, the equity is up over 135% year-over-year.
Options traders have been more bearish than usual. At the International Securities Exchange (ISE), Cboe Options Exchange (CBOE), and NASDAQ OMX PHLX (PHLX), SIG's 50-day put/call volume ratio of 0.88 stands higher than 82% of readings from the past year. This means that while calls are still outnumbering puts on an overall basis, the latter is being picked up at a much quicker clip than what's typically seen.
Echoing this, the stock's Schaeffer's put/call open interest ratio (SOIR) of 0.87 stands higher than 86% of readings from the past 12 months. In other words, short-term options traders are much more put-biased than usual.
Short sellers have also been piling on the jewelry name. Short interest rose 36.1% in the last two reporting periods, and the 4.26 million shares sold short make up 8.3% of the stock's available float. It would take nearly a week to cover at its average daily pace of trading.