That's because the point of this article is "Don't trust these scam artists!" because collective action motivated by hatred of elite rigging the system... is dangerous to those elite.
Now, he usually does proper analysis and did have reasons for stock to run up, it was fun to see his tweets about the mess of trying to track down the shares he bought - https://i.redd.it/utr5k9banpe81.jpg
https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/big-short-in...
[0] https://www.marketwatch.com/amp/story/big-short-trader-micha...
I would agree that Roaring Kitty wasn't much of a catalyst (prior to the price exploding), but was an early proponent of GME.
I do distinctly remember deciding to invest in GME around December 22nd of 2020, based on what I was reading on the Wall Street Bets forum (unfortunately only like 50 shares.) It was a major daily topic on there from mid December (or earlier) on. Michael Burry was rarely mentioned as a holder, he had bought into GME a lot earlier. The conversation mostly centered on short interest, fundamentals and future moves GME would do.
So I would argue it was 'the collective' on WSB that was perhaps one of the larger catalysts.
It's not.
The elite are largely shielded from the volatility of the masses.
It's the "middle class" whose retirement, pensions and life savings are tied up in the market that end up getting hit the most.
What does this mean?
Basically: buy a few index funds, don’t sweat trying to beat the market, you’ll come out alright.
EDIT TO ADD: Sincerely, thank you for your comment (and the replies providing additional context). It's given me some much needed information to go research (ala Boglehead investing).
It was apparently also very dangerous to retail investors.
The people that are holding and directly registering their shares know differently.
There is no final reckoning, where GMR is going to shoot to 10 thousand dollars a share, and cause the world economy to crash.
There was a large initial spike, in retail investment, initially, and then when the hype went down, so did the price.
And that's that. The prophecy of the short squeeze isn't coming.
As in give me a date. On that exact day, I can come back to you when the prophecy did not come true, and see if you are willing to admit that you were wrong, or if you will just come up with another excuse for why the prophecy is delayed.
Do you see the problem here? No matter what you say, if you give me a day for when the prophecy is going to happen, you can just make up an excuse later.
That's the issue with conspiracy theories. They are not falsifiable.
No one said this would take a day or a month. The expression is "diamond hands"; being patient is not easy. No one know when it will happen. But what we do know is that there continues to be a steady flow of investors whom are directly registering their shares every day.
On the other hand, your position cannot be falsified because you dismiss all of the available data as manipulated without proof.
Smells desperate.
But with the prophecy predictors, the same is not the case. No matter how long goes on, with the doomsday not happening, a doomsday predictor can just make up an excuse for why the doomsday was delayed.
So once again, give me a date. Surely there must be a day, where if this goes on long enough, with no doomsday, that you will admit that you got duped, and this is all nonsense.
because I am happy to come back to you, on that day, to see if you are willing to take in new information, or if you will just come up with some excuse for why doomsday got delayed.
See the difference between your's , and my position? With me, if the doomsday happens, then that is when I am proven wrong. For you, if the doomsday doesn't happen, for however long, you can just make up a reason for why it got delayed.
Or, in other words, the doomsday is not falsifiable.
> /you/ the conspiracy nut
You are the one predicting a doomsday, supposedly right? Every day that the doomsday does not happen, is more evidence that I am right. Just give a date. Give me a day, when you will say "Well I guess the doomsday isn't coming". I will mark it on my calendar.
If you do not give a date, then you are literally admitting that your position cannot be falsified, because you are saying that no matter how long goes by, with the million dollar short squeeze, you will not be convinced.
I can be convinced. If price hits a million dollars, I was wrong. You can't be convinced, if you are unwilling to give a day when you'd admit that you got duped.
Institutional investors that got caught naked short selling can manipulate the price and stall but they can't stall forever -- and every single day it gets harder and harder.
Will it go to $10,000? Who knows. There's a price not much above that which would crush world markets to the point where it would usher in the apocalypse. There would be intervention before that happened.
Very few of these GME investors are solely trying to make some money. They see a corrupt market place and they want to take it down. The SEC could have just done its job but it didn't. They could have stopped the naked shorting. They could have curbed the corruption. They didn't. Instead an army (make no mistake) of small retail investors are buying and holding and registering their shares. You may not understand it, but this is war.
And look at the vitriol. Flat-earthers? Conspiracy nut? It's funny because if I buy Netflix because I think the price will go up, no one tells me that. There are no articles saying, "Netflix's growth is over! Everyone sell! Please, God, sell!" Can you imagine the buy button (but not sell button) being turned off for Netflix for a day during a price run-up? Don't be confused. This is war.
If you want a date, let's give it two years. Who knows and frankly the investors don't care.
Total nonsense, but entertaining in a car-crash kind of way.
The reality is that hedge funds engaged in illegal naked short selling, confident that they would never get caught because the SEC has essentially abandoned its role. And a group of retail investors decided simply to buy and hold registered shares of that firm, knowing that simply by doing that, they could bleed those SHFs out or force them to close their position at a much higher price. There's a lot of due diligence out there that backs that position up if you want to look -- but you don't.
Here's the thing, you can like it or not like it. No one cares. However, it's worth noting that it's the only position you'll see be called names and screamed at. "Don't hold! Oh God it's been a year why are you still holding?! God! Stop! Please, stop!"
What people do care about is telling you that no, there isn’t some shadowy cabal of hedge funds with your name pinned to a wall under the heading “number one risk to the financial system”.
Continue to hold, but please do understand you’re quite deep in a self-reinforcing grandiose doomsday conspiracy that makes you feel special. None of which have ever historically bore fruit, not for lack of waiting and money invested.
> some shadowy cabal of hedge funds
You keep diving into hyperbole. It's just hedge funds that bought naked short positions and got caught by the market. It's pretty simple.
> Instead an army (make no mistake) of small retail investors…
> You may not understand it, but this is war.
> Don't be confused. This is war.
I keep diving into hyperbole? I think this conversation has run its course.
What's new here is that this is the first time in history that retail has simply used collective buying power to catch them out at it. By simply en masse buying and holding directly registered shares, it puts them over a barrel.
The statements that it's war or what could happen aren't hyperbole -- and I find that fascinating. We'll see...
The vitrol is due to the fact that no matter how long the conspiracy doomsday fails to happen, you will come up with an excuse for why the doomsday got delayed.
> If you want a date, let's give it two years.
So then, if in 2 years, the financial doomsday doesn't happen, you will admit "yep, I got totally tricked by an internet conspiracy, and have no idea what I was thinking, and I will try not be convinced by conspiracy theories anymore, and nobody should listen to what I had to say about any of this stuff previously"?
Or will you just make up another reason why the doomsday didn't happen?
> I think the price will go up
Its not about price going up by a couple percentage points. Instead, the issue is this unfalsifiable conspiracy, of financial collapse and doomsday that people are predicting, and will accept no amount of evidence to the contrary, no matter how long this doomsday fails to materialize.
You're not angry at hedge funds for naked short selling? You're not mad at the front running? Did you or did you not see that the buy option was turned off for one stock on a critical day last year during a run-up in price and no one went to jail? You're not furious that the SEC has abandoned its job?
The retail investors doing this are all holding long-term. The motto is, "We just like the stock." Maybe they're sanguine because they think time is on their side or maybe they like the stock. What's the problem? The only one trying to put a date on it and losing their mind and name-calling is you.
Your righteousness feels false here.
Or will you just make up another excuse?
That is what I mean by falsifiability. If you do not say that you will admit that you were wrong, if this mythical doomsday does not happen, then by definition you are saying that you cannot be convinced out of your position, no matter how long goes by, without the doomsday happening.
That would be falsifiability, if you agree that yes you will agree that you fell for a conspiracy theory, in that situation.
If you make up an excuse, then by definition, your opinion is unfalsifiable.
And being prepared to hold for a long time is key. Here's why: let's say it's true. Let's say that hedge funds did engage in naked shorting of a company seemingly headed for the dust bin. If this buy, register and hold strategy was for only x months, then the hedge funds can wait to close out their position. Right? Is that confusing? By saying, "There's no end," it puts tremendous pressure on these hedge funds.
I've listed several places where the markets have been shown to be corrupt and rigged. People still go to jail for insider trading but not for any of these other, much worse, market manipulations? And you ignored it. What has incurred your wrath, instead, is that a large group of people would buy, register and hold a stock they like and not state unequivocally when they were going to sell. That's what has made you mad.
The math of all of this is that either don't understand what I'm saying or you do, which means you're either a little fool or a giant asshole.
If you do not have a timeline for your predictions of financial doomsday, then that by definition means that your predictions are unfalsifiable. Which is the problem there I have trying to bring up this entire time.
It is a big problem, if you are literally saying that no matter how long goes on, without the doomsday happening, then you will just make up an excuse for why the doomsday got delayed.
That is a problem, because then the belief is not falsifiable.
The markets have been corrupt for quite a while. This may be its Bastille moment.
There's no global conspiracy to hide shorts of GameStop. It's flat-earth level nonsense. The SEC report spelled everything out, I suggest reading it.
>No one will know until all shares are registered
So we'll never know, because it's obviously not going to happen. Retail doesn't even own half the shares, if redditors manage to hit 10M shares registered I'll be impressed. I really didn't expect to read this drivel on Hacker News frankly.
What is a "SHF"? What data do you base this on? Last I checked, short interest is around 20%.
Collective participation in the stock market is a good thing for the elite, though they may not all see it that way.
If reporting is becoming irrelevant and shallow, we (collectively) have only ourselves to blame by not supporting (with money) deep investigative journalism.
Spending your own money on quality news papers is not the only way to support good journalism. You could also ask your national government to spend more tax money towards your national media company (if you have one) or towards subsidizing independent ones. Or you could champion pro-consumer legislation which might prevent ad monopolies like google from swallowing most of the ad revenue.
Asking consumers to spend their money correctly is probably the least effective way of increasing the quality of production.
Between authors, podcasts, youtubers, and the sheer amount of raw data out there, I think we can do away with the whole concept of “news”