The GameStop short squeeze
You might remember it as GME squeeze, apes together strong, r/wallstreetbets GameStop
This spread through many posts rather than one canonical upload.
2021·Short-form and streams·dramatic
A message board moved a share price thirty-fold and made the machinery of the market a public spectacle.
At a glanceThe facts
- Remembered as
- GME squeeze
- Spread in
- 2021
- Format
- Event
- Where it started
- The subreddit r/wallstreetbets
- Who or what it shows
- Keith Gill, known as Roaring Kitty on YouTube and by a ruder name on Reddit
- Origin
- No single original
- Available
- Not held by ViralWorld
What this wasThe story
In January 2021 users of the Reddit forum r/wallstreetbets noticed that roughly 140 per cent of GameStop's available shares had been sold short, and bought. The rush by short sellers to cover drove the price up further, and on 28 January the stock touched over five hundred dollars against seventeen at the start of the month. Brokerages including Robinhood then halted buying, which turned a trade into a political argument.
Dozens of class actions followed the trading halt, the episode reshaped retail trading regulation debates, and it produced two feature films and a durable folk memory of a moment when the crowd appeared to win. Whether it actually did remains contested.
Why it matteredWhat changed
Members of a Reddit forum drove one company’s share price from seventeen dollars to four hundred and eighty-three in four weeks, and a hedge fund betting against it lost more than half its value.
TimelineIn order
- Took off
The shares close up 92.7 per cent in a day. Elon Musk’s tweet “Gamestonk!!” follows.1
- Record
The shares reach 483 dollars, having opened the month at 17.25. The trading app Robinhood stops its customers buying them.1
- Mainstream
A committee of the United States House of Representatives holds a hearing.1
- Later
Melvin Capital, the fund that lost 53 per cent in January 2021, closes.1
- Mainstream
A film about it, Dumb Money, is released.1
- Came back
Keith Gill posts a picture after a long silence. The shares rise 74 per cent the next day.1
What people misrememberSet straight
Commonly remembered asElon Musk’s tweet started it.
ActuallyThe shares had already nearly doubled that day before he tweeted.1
Commonly remembered asSmall investors beat the hedge funds.
ActuallySome hedge funds were buying too, and reportedly made large profits. The shares fell more than 80 per cent from the peak within days.1
Why it is here: something the internet still knows by name · a moment that changed what the internet did next · it got out of its own corner of the internet fast · still being watched and quoted years later
Where it came fromWhat we know
This spread through many posts rather than one identifiable original. The example shown is one surviving copy and is not claimed as the first.
Nothing here is claimed to be the first version of this. It spread through many posts rather than from one identifiable original.
Not established. This index only names a creator where the evidence supports it.
ConnectedFollow it further
- Spread by r/wallstreetbetsPhenomenon · 2012
Users of the subreddit r/wallstreetbets initially triggered the squeeze.
SourcesWhat was read
Sources last read on . That date is about the history on this page. Whether the media still plays is checked separately and can change any day. How ViralWorld documents things