Is ‘Roaring Kitty’ taking advantage of retail traders?

GameStop (GME) shares are climbing after “Roaring Kitty,” best known for the 2021 short squeeze, posted a screenshot to Reddit showing a nearly $175 million position in the meme stock. Citron Research Founder Andrew Left joins Market Domination Overtime to discuss why he is re-shorting the stock after being burned by the 2021 rally.

Left says that today’s rally is “totally different” from what happened in 2021, adding, “I personally do not believe this is his own personal money.” He explains that Roaring Kitty’s position is an exorbitant amount of money, and he doubts he put his entire net worth on the trade.

“What he’s doing right now is trying to take advantage of the retail traders, the same people that he was supposed to represent three and a half years ago,” Left says, noting that he decided to short the stock because of its short interest and its capital structure changing from 2021. He explains, “I just hope the retail investors realize right now that this is not what we saw three and a half years ago.”

For more expert insight and the latest market action, click here to watch this full episode of Market Domination Overtime.

This post was written by Melanie Riehl

Video Transcript

Gamestop shares surging as retail traders pile in after Keith Gill, also known as Roaring Kitty showed a position in the video game retailer, a rather large 11 meme frenzy critic.

However, taking this as a chance to re short the stock, Andrew left on research founder joining us now to discuss Andrew.

First of all, it’s good to see you again.

I hope you’re doing well.

I thought you hung this up.

I thought you weren’t going to do this anymore that you had given up.

I can’t believe it.

I can’t believe it’s 3.5 years later.

We’re still talking about gamestop.

I can’t either.

So what, what, what drew you back in every time you try to leave and pull you back in what happened this morning?

So you, I wake up this morning, you know, I’ve traded the stock small but I wake up this morning.

I see where you trading and you see why it’s trading there and so much is wrong.

See the first time going back 3.5 years, I kind of understand what it is.

There was a high short interest in the stock.

It became some g global movement.

Uh you know, the Eat the Rich.

Uh He became a folk hero this roaring kitty.

He put an actual thesis up.

He made a video online why he thought gamestop was undervalued.

Uh And he, and he actually put investment thesis, albeit he was wrong, it went higher and you know, the rest is folklore today was totally different.

We wake up to today and all of a sudden last night he puts this monster position, no thesis.

Story continues

He’s been wrong, short term options.

I personally do not believe this is his own personal money.

Why do you, why do you say that, Andrew?

I mean, just let’s do math.

I mean, what’s the size of this trade that he put on today?

100 and what, 100 and 50 million?

100 and 15, something like that.

But he said 100 and 50 million, you know, how, how much did he make first time around if he made, you know, 200 million after taxes, you have 100 million.

Do you think he put his whole net worth on this trade?

If he made 250 million?

I don’t think he made 250 million.

If you go online, it says he made somewhere around 50 million, 60 million.

So I just don’t think it’s his money, you know, and, and, and there should be some form of disclosure if it’s not, you know, that he’s went out to really shake this world up.

And also he did give us a thesis.

It’s not like he said, I’m buying it for a reason.

So either he has MNP.

I, and I don’t think he does fair enough.

I don’t think there’s anything gamestop is gonna say in the next two weeks, we, what are they gonna say?

They’re opening an A I fund with the money they raised?

Uh It just seems to me it was completely different.

It was almost like what he’s doing right now is trying to take advantage of the retail traders, the same people that he was supposed to represent 3.5 years ago.

So Andrew, what do you, what are you doing this time around?

What position have you taken?

Well, first of all, whenever a short game, stop start, now you do it cautiously and you know, you do it prudent.

You understand, I think everyone learned, any trader learned 3.5 years ago that anything can happen.

And the last thing you want to say is it’s different this time, but I think it’s different this time.

Uh namely you don’t have the same short interest you had in it.

Uh When we’ve seen the capital structure of the company is different and people see how it’s played out more.

So, yeah.

So, you know, obviously, I think if given the opportunity to short the stock when it was $40 this morning, it’s great.

I think if somebody, you know, I don’t recommend people short stocks but I think anyone who’s buying the stock right now, I think they’re gonna get, it’s gonna be short term.

I think they, they won’t have any patience for, uh, the kiddy nonsense.

Do you, Andrew?

I’m just curious.

What do you think gamestop’s future is as a company?

Do you even think of it as a company?

Well, I mean, Ryan Cohen doesn’t need them.

They pretty much almost abandoned their strategy, right?

You know, he wants to use the money in the corporate uh coffers to go ahead and do outside investments.

So I think they’ve taken the whole notion of, you know, what Gamestop could be and it’s gone, you know, think of the different iterations it’s had in the past three years.

It was gonna be something in the crypto space.

I was gonna do something, you know, that didn’t go.

Obviously, the Gamestop didn’t work, the streaming didn’t work, partnerships don’t work.

And I was just gonna be a uh an investing vehicle for, for, for Ryan Cohen.

So, you know, the future of gamestop is, I mean, what am I gonna say?

They also the Gamestop Token rally today.

So I would have never even that there would be a Gamestop token.

So, and, and just quickly here, there was also a report that E trade was considering moving his account from the platform.

What’s your reaction to that?

I think it’s awkward to post, huh?

You’re talking to me.

I believe that people should put their opinions online.

If you believe in your opinion of the stock, put it online to post your actual account without anything behind it.

It just seems a bit, something about it seems wrong and I guess I, I can’t pick out what it is.

I guess e trade felt the same way if, in fact, they do this, if, in fact, this is his account.

If in fact, a lot of different things, there’s a lot of ifs, oh, finally Andrew the last time this happened and you shorted the stock.

You, I mean, I seem to recall, you got threats, right?

You got a lot of flak and that’s why you kind of pulled back.

You felt like you’re perhaps weren’t safe as a result of all this.

Are you worried about this this time?

As you said, this feels different, it just feels different.

First of all, it’s not a jihad against Gamestop.

You know, I, I think people understand, it’s amazing.

I think, I think investors understand now differently.

I think, um you know, I think people are not, we’ve changed a lot and I think the retail mentality has changed a lot.

I still think people are incredibly mean online.

I still think Reddit and Twitter or X is, is a real mean place.

A lot of times that I don’t enjoy even reading about, I’m just, you know, give me fair market commentary.

So I haven’t looked at my emails.

I kind of won’t read Twitter or Reddit, what they say about me.

I really don’t care.

Uh You know, I, I just hope the retail investors realize right now.

Uh This is not what we saw 3.5 years ago.

I really don’t care if they don’t, if somebody wants to buy the stock at 3035 and if the stock goes to 50 it goes to 50.

So, you know, it goes to 80 goes to 80.

So I lose money.

You know, it’s, it’s a free market.

It is indeed.

Andrew.

Thank you so much for talking to us.

It’s good to see you again.

Thank you.