Liquidity & Technicals

Liquidity & Technicals

Charter is a deeply liquid, large-cap name — the stock can absorb roughly $561M of execution over five trading days at 20% ADV, so liquidity is not the binding constraint for any reasonable institutional position. The tape, however, is unambiguous: a death cross in August 2025, a 25.5% one-day Q1-2026 earnings break on 7x volume, price 27% below its 200-day average, and 30-day realized volatility at a five-year extreme — this is a downtrend confirmed by distribution, not a quiet drawdown.

1. Portfolio implementation verdict

2. Price snapshot

The 52-week range is $158.65–$427.25; the stock sits in the bottom 5% of that range. The all-time high of $823 was set in August 2021 — current price is roughly 79% below that peak.

3. The trend chart — full history with 50/200-day SMAs

This is a downtrend regime. The decade chart shows a clear three-phase structure: secular uptrend through August 2021 (peak $823), a 2022 capitulation, a 2023–2024 base/recovery, and a 2025–2026 second leg lower. Today's price is below the levels of every period since 2016 except brief 2018 and 2022 lows — the trend is not in question.

4. Relative strength

5. Momentum — RSI and MACD

RSI sits at 32.7, a touch above the 30 oversold line after printing 23.9 on April 28; it has not yet flipped through 50, which would be the minimum requirement for a momentum turn. The MACD histogram crashed to −7.4 on the Q1-2026 print and has not yet stabilized — note that every meaningful negative excursion in the past 18 months (July 2025 break, January 2026 dip, April 2026 break) coincided with a price-leg lower. This is unconfirmed momentum: oversold but not yet turning.

6. Volume, conviction, and volatility regime

The three biggest volume events of the past decade are dominated by sell-side flow — only the 2016 spike was constructive, and even that was a flat day on speculation rather than a directional advance. Crucially, the most recent spike (April 24, 2026, 7x average) was the Q1 print: −25.5% on heavy distribution, and the bounce that followed has come on materially lighter volume (4M shares on May 1 versus 13M on the break). That pattern — heavy down-days, light up-days — is the signature of an unfinished decline, not a base.

Realized vol prints 95.7% at the latest close — at the absolute five-year high of the series and 2.5x the p80 "stressed" band of 38.8%. The August 2025 break started the regime shift; the April 2026 print pushed it to a new extreme. Options markets are pricing this as an event-driven name now, not a stable cable utility — sizing decisions should reflect that wider risk premium.

7. Institutional liquidity panel

ADV 20-day is elevated versus the 60-day baseline (3.27M vs 2.25M shares) because the post-earnings sell-off pulled forward volume. Annual turnover of 359% — meaning the entire share base traded over 3.5 times in the last year — is itself a distress flag: ownership is rotating heavily, consistent with a forced-seller dynamic. Even on the lower 60-day baseline, daily traded value sits at roughly $474M, well into the institutionally implementable range.

Fund-capacity table

At a normal-aggressive 20% ADV participation, a fund clears $561M of CHTR — equal to 2.4% of market cap — over five sessions; that footprint supports a 5% portfolio position for a fund up to roughly $11.2B AUM, or a 2% position for a fund up to roughly $28B. At a more conservative 10% ADV the supported AUM halves: $5.6B and $14.0B respectively. For most fundamental funds, sizing — not liquidity — sets the constraint.

Liquidation runway

A 0.5%-of-market-cap position ($118M) clears in 2 sessions at 20% ADV; a 1% position in 3 sessions; a 2% position in 5. At 10% ADV, the same footprints take 3, 5, and 9 sessions respectively. Median 60-day daily range is 1.53% — modestly elevated versus mega-cap norms but well under the 2% threshold that signals impact-cost pressure for size; the friction here is volatility regime, not bid-ask cost.

Bottom line for execution: the largest issuer-level position that clears inside five sessions is 2.0% of market cap at 20% ADV (or 1.0% at 10% ADV). Liquidity is not the constraint at any reasonable institutional size.

8. Technical scorecard and stance

Stance — bearish on a 3-to-6-month horizon. The tape is unanimous: price is below both moving averages, momentum has not yet turned, distribution is heavy, vol is at five-year extremes, and relative performance is decisively negative. A 4.9-percentile 52-week position is statistically interesting for mean-reversion, but in a confirmed downtrend it is a level to test and break before it is a level to defend. Above $235.99 (reclaim of the 200-day SMA, currently 37% above spot) — the bearish view is invalidated and a base-building thesis becomes investable. Below $158.65 (the 52-week low) — confirms continuation and opens a move toward longer-dated support in the $130–145 zone implied by the 2018/2022 lows. Liquidity is not the constraint; the correct action is watchlist only — a fund can build a meaningful position in a few sessions when the tape turns, so there is no premium for entering early into a regime that has not yet stopped trending lower.