(Bloomberg) — GameStop Corp.’s latest madness has brought a major critic of the meme stock craze – and a notable loser in 2021 – off the sidelines with a new short position.
Andrew Left, the founder of Citron Research, placed a new bet against the video game retailer whose stock price rose as much as 75% on Monday after Keith Gill, an investor and meme stock influencer who goes by DeepF-ing Value on Reddit, showed a five million stake GameStop stock. In May, Left also announced a short position in the company’s stock.
“I covered my May short and went short again today,” Left said in an interview with Bloomberg, noting the position is smaller than his previous one, without disclosing its size.
GameStop’s jump early in trading added about $6 billion to its market cap and caused a trading freeze due to volatility. The stock lost some of its gains after it resumed trading, but was still up more than 30% by early afternoon Monday. Shares remain well below their closing peak of $86.88 on January 27, 2021.
Meme stocks have been a new fascination for the stock markets for a few weeks now since the return to social media of Gill, who goes by “Roaring Kitty” on X. Gill rose to fame in 2021 by aggregating retailers on Reddit. Indeed, it was a June 2 post on Reddit that sparked this latest trading wave in shares of the beleaguered video game retailer.
“He might as well be a hedge fund manager,” Left said.
In turn, Left was hit hard in the previous meme stock saga, as a bearish bet on GameStop led to staggering losses for Citron Research. His company was also at the center of a U.S. Department of Justice investigation into short selling by hedge funds and research firms.
In early 2021, Left announced that the company would no longer publish short selling research, ending a two-decade practice. He has since returned to writing them, albeit less frequently.
“I have no ill will toward the company,” Left said. “It’s not even a business, it’s a trading vehicle.”
—With help from Sam Potter and Bailey Lipschultz.
©2024 BloombergLP
