HPQ vs peers AI infrastructure: HP Inc. reports earnings on Nov 24, 2026, 15 days out, and the row carries two numbers that pull in opposite directions. The stock trades at 9.1 times forward earnings, the fourth cheapest of the 51 names we scan, and 9.8% of its float is sold short, the ninth most crowded position on our table.

The book is the third fact. Eighteen analysts cover the name and only two are on the buy side, the thinnest conviction reading on the table apart from one name nobody rates a buy. The score lands at 46, second-lowest in the universe.

Is HPQ a better AI stock to buy than its peers?

On the two things this page compares, no. HP Inc. is one of the cheapest names we track on forward earnings and one of the most crowded, and its book is the least enthusiastic of the 51 rows we publish.

Cheapness is real. At 9.1 times forward earnings and 10.9 times trailing, only MOMO at 4.5, JD at 7.1 and GLOB at 7.7 are cheaper. The crowding runs the other way: only VNET at 30.1%, PATH at 25.0% and TTD at 22.1% carry more short interest than HPQ's 9.8%.

The row, 15 days out

Score 46 at rank 45 of 51, sector Technology, print date November 24, earnings sentiment Positive, short interest 9.8% of float, market capitalization $25.85 billion, implied volatility 64.4, and a scan price of $28.67.

Decomposed, the 46 is 18 points for analyst coverage, 2.8 for an 11.1% buy-side share, nothing for the strong-buy column, 10.4 for a 10.4% fourteen-day implied move, and the full 15 for a Positive sentiment reading. That totals 46.2.

Thirty-two of those points are coverage and sentiment, which say almost nothing about the business. The analyst book contributes 2.8 of them, and the event the options market has priced contributes 10.4.

Where HPQ sits on the multiple

The forward number is the one that makes the case. At 9.1 times forward earnings against 10.9 times trailing, the street is underwriting 20.4% more earnings than the trailing line shows, from $2.62 a share to $3.15.

The PEG tells the harder version of that story. At 3.04 it is the seventh highest among the names we scan, behind CRWD at 5.60, SNOW at 4.94, DIS at 3.80, CEG at 3.74, CPRT at 3.21 and SLAB at 3.12.

Read next to the multiple, it says the market is paying 9.1 times for growth it cannot see yet. A cheap multiple on a cheap-looking estimate is not the same thing as a cheap stock.

The crowding table

Short interest is the clearest thing about HP Inc. Nearly a tenth of the float is sold short into a November 24 print, and the names ahead of it on that measure are the ones with the widest events on the board.

VNET carries 30.1% of float short with a 148.7 implied volatility, PATH 25.0% at 80.7 and TTD 22.1% at 209.5. ASAN at 21.0%, GLOB at 20.3%, WIX at 18.2%, NCNO at 18.1% and IQ at 14.3% fill the run down to HPQ.

Crowding cuts both ways into an event. A short base can be squeezed on good news and can be the reason a bad print falls further, and the position tells you which way the asymmetry leans when the print lands.

The same print date: seven names, one cheap and one crowded

Seven names on our table print on November 24. BILI leads at 87, then DELL at 84, ADSK and ADI at 83, WDAY at 76, NTNX at 59, and HP Inc. at 46.

Against those six, HPQ is the cheapest and the most crowded at the same time. Its 9.1 times forward earnings is below DELL at 10.9, BILI at 11.2, WDAY at 14.6, ADSK at 18.3, NTNX at 21.7 and ADI at 22.6, and its 9.8% of float short is the highest of the seven.

The books do not line up either. ADI has 91.2% of its ratings on the buy side and BILI 96.7%, while WDAY is at 45.2% and HPQ at 11.1%, with NTNX at 58.8%, DELL at 69.0% and ADSK at 80.6% in between.

DELL is the sharpest contrast. It prints the same day, carries a score of 84, trades at 10.9 times forward earnings, and has 110.4 of implied volatility against HPQ's 64.4. The market is paying for a much larger move in one of the two.

Where the price has been sitting this month

The settled closes show HP Inc. bleeding out through October and bottoming out at the end of it. The stock closed at $30.20 on Oct 9, ran to $34.09 on Oct 26, and then gave all of it back.

It closed Nov 6 at $28.46, down 3.33% on the session, 1.11% lower over the week and 5.76% lower over the month. The low close of the past month was $28.27 on Nov 3, so the stock is sitting a penny above the floor of its own range with 15 days left to run.

The move into the print has been one-way. Nothing in the close series suggests a market that has already found a floor, and the options market is not pricing a quiet one: a $1.60 straddle on a four-day expiry is 64.4 of implied volatility.

What the crowd and the multiple disagree about

That disagreement is the trade. A stock at 9.1 times forward earnings with 9.8% of float short is either mispriced or the market has already worked out what the multiple is missing, and the analyst book says the second.

Two of eighteen ratings on the buy side, ten holds and six sells, is a book that has already made up its mind. The one lever left is the event, because the implied move is the one column on the row that can still move on its own before the print.

And the timing works against a patient reader. A 15-day window is the far edge of the pre-earnings setup, and the two cheapest names on our board, MOMO at 4.5 times forward earnings and GLOB at 7.7, both carry more short interest than HP Inc. does.

Our scan runs at 6:33 a.m. Pacific time, and every row it builds is published at our open data.

So HPQ vs peers AI infrastructure is a comparison the record settles on three counts. HP Inc. is the fourth cheapest name we scan on forward earnings, the ninth most crowded, and the least enthusiastic book on the table, into a print that shares a date with six names that are none of those things.

Whether that makes it a better AI stock to buy than its peers is a judgment the reader makes, not one this page makes.

Questions on HP Inc. before the November 24 print

When does HPQ report earnings?

HP Inc. reports on November 24, 2026, 15 days from the November 9 morning scan, which carried the row with the print date set to November 24 and 15 days left on it.

How crowded is HPQ against the rest of the table?

9.8% of float is short, behind VNET at 30.1%, PATH at 25.0%, TTD at 22.1%, ASAN at 21.0%, GLOB at 20.3%, WIX at 18.2%, NCNO at 18.1% and IQ at 14.3%. It is the most crowded of the seven names printing on November 24.

What did the analyst book on HPQ look like?

Eighteen ratings: no strong buys, two buys, ten holds and six sells. That is 11.1% on the buy side, worth 2.8 of the 25 points the conviction column can award, and the thinnest book on our table apart from one name nobody rates as a buy.