GameStop (GME) shares fell nearly 40% in highly volatile trading on Friday as GameStop filed to sell millions of shares – and more than half a million viewers tuned in to a highly anticipated YouTube livestream of ‘Roaring Kitty,’ an alias used by bullish retail. investor Keith Gill.
The event marked Gill’s first live appearance on the channel since the investor helped spark a meme stock rally in 2021 through his bullish videos and posts about the video game retailer.
The stream started with a video clip of kittens playing, interspersed with shots of Gill. He then appeared in front of a screenshot of a Yahoo Finance stock page for GameStop.
“It’s going to be a bet on management. Particularly obviously Ryan, f***ing Cohen. Ryan Cohen and his team. That’s what people need to focus on,” Gill said.
He added, “I see plenty that I think this guy could do.” He noted that “nothing on this stream is advice.”
Gill also said the screenshots of GameStop holdings posted on social media earlier this week are his.
“The accounts that hold my positions are mine. These are my positions. I don’t work with anyone else. I don’t work with hedge funds,” he said.
The stock was halted more than a dozen times on Friday amid highly volatile trading. It had popped up for the YouTube stream in the wake of quarterly results that missed analyst estimates and announced a stock sale.
For the first quarter, GameStop reported an adjusted loss of $0.12 per share, compared with estimates of a loss of $0.09. Net sales fell 29% to $882 million, compared to analyst estimates of $995.5 million. Wall Street expected quarterly results later this month.
The company also filed to sell up to 75 million additional shares. Last month, GameStop sold 45 million shares, generating about $930 million in proceeds.
The announcements followed the stock’s 47% rise in the previous session after “Roaring Kitty” scheduled its livestream.
After the market closed Thursday, “DeepF***ingValue,” a Reddit account also linked to Gill, posted a screenshot purportedly showing the user’s portfolio ballooning to $586 million, including GameStop stock holdings and non- exercised option positions.
GameStop shares have been on a roller coaster ride over the past month as Gill resurfaced on social media, leading to some calls for Gill to be investigated. The stock rose 180% in the span of two days in mid-May after “Roaring Kitty.” posted for the first time on X, formerly known as Twitter, since 2021.
“The fact that this person bought short-dated call options on GameStop and then tweeted for the first time in a while – knowing that these people from Reddit WallStreetBets would then drive up the stock price… it’s shady,” Loop Capital Markets director Anthony Chukumba told Thursday afternoon Yahoo Finance.
Earlier this week, the office of the top securities regulator in Massachusetts confirmed to Reuters that it has opened an investigation into “Roaring Kitty’s” GameStop trades.
Late Monday, following the user’s emergence over the weekend, the Wall Street Journal reported that executives at Morgan Stanley’s (MS) E-Trade platform were considering starting an account linked to the screenshot. GameStop shares fell about 5% the next day.
Last month’s rally was short-lived and analysts have warned that the meme action this time around is a far cry from the level of retail inflows three years ago.
Ines Ferre is a senior business reporter for Yahoo Finance. Follow her on X @ines_ferre.
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