Overview
- Avis Budget shares spiked Tuesday to an intraday high of $256.99 and closed up 20% at $255.15 in the latest burst of options-driven buying.
- The stock had already climbed about 118% over the past month heading into Tuesday, with only 13.05 million shares freely trading and roughly 20% of that float sold short.
- Traders piled into call options, which pushed market makers to buy shares to hedge those contracts, and that buying loop pulled the price higher and pressured shorts to cover.
- Hertz rose about 8% to $5.70 on Tuesday on similar bullish options flow, reflecting how tightly held rental-car stocks can jump together when trading activity builds.
- Analysts keep a bearish stance with a consensus Reduce rating and an average target near $115, while recent results show a Q4 loss of $21.25 per share, a $518 million EV write-down, about $6.1 billion in debt, negative equity, and an at-the-market plan to sell up to 5 million shares.