It’s the surprise that no one expected. Shares of American video game retailer Gamestop soared this Monday and reached $29.65 at 7 p.m. (French time). A jump of… almost 70% compared to the day before. GameStop’s trading was even interrupted several times due to its high volatility, according to information from CNBC.
Behind this sudden craze lies the publication of a tweet from Keith Gill, aka “Roaring Kitty” on essay. This former broke financial analyst had been at the heart of the turbulence on Wall Street in 2021 defending in video, on Twitter at the time and on Reddit, the purchase of GameStop shares. He then accused speculative investment funds of wanting the death of video game stores. Many small online shareholders followed it, causing the stock to soar: its value was then multiplied by 21 in two weeks, representing an increase in its value of 2000% thanks to the enthusiasm of individual investors who were gathered on the social network Reddit. Enough to lead funds like Melvin Capital to suffer significant losses. The latter had to urgently cover his positions betting on a decline in the stock, while it continued to rise. Melvin Capital even had to be bailed out to the tune of $2.75 billion by other investment companies.
On Sunday, Keith Gill reactivated his The post has been viewed more than 15 million times. At 5 p.m. this Monday, the Internet user posted a video of Thanos, Marvel hero, saying “fine, I’ll do it myself.” It is followed by another extract showing the hero Wolwerine, emerging from a bath, claws out, roaring. Thirty minutes later, Keith Gill posted a new video asking if his fans “were still there”, adding that “it was over”. At 6 p.m., another video of around thirty seconds mentions “an opening” with the red eye of a dragon.
Keith Gill has not yet specified the content of these videos but could lead to a scenario similar to that of 2021. “Roaring Kitty seems to be the most likely to explain today’s renewed interest […] but I will be careful not to define the participants in this phenomenon as investors,” warns Art Hogan, chief market strategist at B Riley Wealth.
The rise of Gamestop this Monday also leads to that of the trading application Robinhood Markets, at 7%, used by individual investors during the crazy rally on Gamstop in 2021. Reddit also gained more than 11% this Monday afternoon. At the same time, this was already losing money to investment funds which had instead bet in the future on the fall in the shares of GameStop, a group with rather pessimistic prospects.