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The Big Short’s Burry New Post: First Short Ever – Caterpillar $CAT, Further Shorts on AI and Semis

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Burry's assessment is that the valuation has reached an extreme he has not seen in his 30-year career, and it is "just a matter of time."

Original Title: "Big Short's Burry's New Article: First-time Shorting Caterpillar $CAT, Further Shorting AI and Semiconductor"

TechFlow Summary: The prototype of "The Big Short," Michael Burry, revealed his latest short positions. He initiated a short position on Caterpillar $CAT, the best performer in the S&P 500 this year (up 86% in the first half), at an entry price of $1060.98.

On the same day, he also opened new short positions on Nvidia, Applied Materials, Tesla, and the Philadelphia Semiconductor ETF (SOXX).

These targets are almost all core beneficiaries of the AI infrastructure rally. Burry's judgment is that the valuation has reached an extreme he has not seen in his 30 years, stating that it is "just a matter of time."

Michael Burry, a hedge fund manager famous for accurately predicting the 2008 subprime mortgage crisis, posted on his paid Substack column "Cassandra Unchained" on June 30, disclosing a batch of new short positions targeting the AI and semiconductor sectors.

The article, titled "Trading Post June 30, 2026," had a core logic summarized in one sentence: "This AI rally has risen to a dangerous level."

According to CNBC, Burry wrote, "This is my first time shorting Caterpillar. In the past, being long this ticket has always made me good money." This statement highlighted the most unusual aspect of this position: Caterpillar is not an AI company; it manufactures construction, mining, and energy equipment.

First-time Shorting Caterpillar at an Entry Price of $1060.98 because it has become an "AI Infrastructure Proxy"

Burry shorted Caterpillar at $1060.98.

What alerted him was the valuation: as the stock price reached a historic high, Caterpillar's Price-to-Sales ratio had risen to the highest level in at least 30 years.

According to GuruFocus data, its Price-to-Earnings ratio is approximately 53 times.

Caterpillar itself is not related to AI, but the market has treated it as a "shovel stock" for global AI infrastructure investment.

As data center construction requires power, transmission, and civil works, more and more funds are flowing into this heavy equipment giant.

As a result, Caterpillar saw an 86% year-to-date increase in the first half of 2026, making it one of the top-performing stocks in the S&P 500 this year.

Burry provided his own interpretation of the direct trigger for the day's surge.

According to TipRanks, he wrote, "The direct impetus for today's surge was a large-scale spending plan announced by South Korea. In my view, this is precisely the beginning of the end of the market rally. It's only a matter of time now."

Shorted NVIDIA, Applied Materials, SOXX within a Day, All Marked with Entry Prices

Caterpillar is not alone.

According to Electrek and Investing.com, Burry disclosed short positions on the same day (June 30) at the following entry prices: NVIDIA at $198.09, Philadelphia Semiconductor ETF (SOXX) at $642.80, Applied Materials at $729.40.

The true focus of this column is not Caterpillar but the semiconductor sector.

Burry's argument centers on extreme valuations: the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index (SOX) is currently more than 65% above its 200-day moving average, a stretch that has historically only occurred once, at the peak of the 2000 dot-com bubble.

He also pointed out that the index's P/S ratio has exceeded 16x, even stating that removing NVIDIA has "almost no impact."

In terms of specific actions, he rolled over the put options on SOXX from January 2027 to March 2027, increased the strike price to just over $400, and continued to hold put options on the Nasdaq ETF (QQQ) for January.

Regarding the semiconductor sector's pullback, he wrote, "It's only a matter of time now."

Shorted Tesla at $416.22, But the Size of This Position Was Not Disclosed

Burry's approach to Tesla was different from his previous positions.

According to Yahoo Finance, he wrote, "Finally, I shorted Tesla at $416.22. Glad to see it back at this level."

Tesla closed at $379.71 the previous trading day, and surged about 10% intraday on Tuesday, indicating that Burry was shorting during the uptrend, not chasing the fall.

It is worth noting that he did not disclose any information about the scale of his Tesla short—no share amount, no dollar amount, and no mention of whether options were used.

This point needs to be approached with extra caution in interpretation.

Media outlets have often exaggerated Burry's past Tesla shorts: Scion's Q1 2021 13F filing showed his holding of put options equivalent to 800,100 Tesla shares, widely reported as a "$534 million" short position, but that was only the nominal value of the options (based on the stock value at the time of closing), not the actual funds he put in (i.e., option premiums, a much smaller scale).

He closed that position in November 2021.

Tesla still fits into Burry's overall bearish logic.

Last December, he criticized Tesla's "ludicrous" share dilution and "ludicrously high" valuation, tying it to Musk's trillion-dollar compensation plan approved by shareholders.

In April this year, after analyzing the audited reports of several tech companies over the past decade, he referred to Tesla as the "King of Tragic Layers"—a type of company where equity incentives exceed both GAAP-calculated incentive expenses and cumulative net income.

This is a "clearance-style short" at quarter-end, but without 13F endorsement

According to Investing.com, this batch of positions reads more like a concentrated sweep against "overheated" targets at quarter-end rather than a single judgment on a specific stock.

Burry had previously fully shifted to a bearish stance: by the third quarter of 2025, Scion held put options for 5 million shares of Palantir (nominal value of about $9.12 billion) and 1 million shares of NVIDIA (about $1.87 billion), with just these two exposures totaling around $11 billion.

He has repeatedly mentioned Oracle, Google, and Microsoft's aggressive data center expansions, warning that the market, in its optimistic AI sentiment, has overlooked the financial risks of heavy capital expenditures and has consistently drawn parallels between the current market and the internet bubble of 1999-2000.

It is worth reminding readers that as of the time of writing, the Caterpillar short position does not have a confirmed 13F filing disclosure.

All information is currently from Burry's own column and social media, not regulatory filings.

The exact size and structure of the position will have to wait for Scion's next 13F for hard data.