Citron Research founder Andrew Left is shorting GameStop again, arguing the stock is “extremely overvalued” after its latest meteoric rise. The veteran short seller got burned on his first bet against meme stock traders’ favorite company of 2021, eventually closing out his short position with a 100% loss and halting publication of short reports after saying an “angry mob” of fanatical GameStop shareholders harassed him.
But Left, who made his name with big bets against pharmaceutical giant Valeant and now-defunct Chinese real estate giant Evergrande, told the Wall Street Journal that he made a profit when he gambled against GameStop again last month.
The video game retailer saw its shares rise from just over $10 in early May to an intraday peak of $64.83 on May 14 after Keith Gill – the trader and de facto meme stock leader who goes by Roaring Kitty – moved to the company referred. in social media posts, prompting retail investors to join in. After that initial surge, GameStop stock eventually fell to a low of $18.93 on May 23, and Left says he was able to close out his short position with a profit during this period. say.
On Monday, the founder of Citron Research doubled down on his bearish bet against GameStop after Gill posted a screenshot on Reddit suggesting he owns more than $100 million worth of the retailer’s stock. “When I saw it, I shorted it,” Left said Bloomberg from the Reddit post.
The rise in GameStop shares “simply doesn’t make sense” and shows that the US has become a “nation of gamblers,” he said in his article. Wall Street Journal interview.
GameStop stock is up more than 33% from its opening price on Monday, but is down more than 23% from its intraday high. That means the potential profitability of Links’ current short position, at least for now, depends on the price at which he could secure shares for the bet.
Regardless, the veteran short seller said he learned not to make big bets against “cult” stocks when he got burned by shorting GameStop in 2021, and his latest short puts a small portion of his portfolio at risk. ‘It’s a cult share. You don’t do that with cult shares,” he told the newspaper Log. “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on you.”
This story originally appeared on Fortune.com
