In the world of meme stocks, Keith Gill, known as Roaring Kitty, remains a significant influence. After announcing a substantial investment in Chewy, an online pet supply retailer, nearly four months ago, Gill has now sold off his entire stake in the company. This move led to a decline in Chewy’s share prices, with a 1% drop on Wednesday.
In July, filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission showed that Gill had acquired 6.6% of Chewy’s shares, hinting at his investments through dog pictures on social media platform X. Gill gained notoriety in 2021 for rallying retail investors to support GameStop, a video game retailer that was on the brink of collapse. At that time, major Wall Street hedge funds and investors were betting against GameStop by shorting its stock.
Roaring Kitty,知名的投资者，已解散其在Chewy的股份，但Meme股票依然活跃。
Gill和认同他的人通过购买数千股GameStop股票改变了其轨迹，尽管几乎所有公认的指标都告诉投资者该公司正面临严重困境。GameStop和Chewy有一个共同联系：Ryan Cohen。他于2011年创立了Chewy，并在2018年辞去CEO职位。Gill看到了Cohen在GameStop的潜力，他现在是那里的CEO。 自那以后，其他Meme股票也出现了，其中最著名的是Trump Media & Technology Group Corp。本周，Trump Media的市值超过了Elon Musk的社交媒体平台X，这既是因为Musk旗下公司的价值崩溃，也是因为Trump Media极其波动的交易，其股票代码为“DJT”。 Meme股票在疫情期间是一种新奇事物，但如今已成为现实，不管你喜不喜欢，它们除了动量和投资者的热情之外，几乎没有其他因素影响其涨跌。Roaring Kitty has liquidated his entire stake in Chewy. In a filing late Tuesday with U.S. regulators, Gill revealed this. He had more than 9 million shares at one point and was the company’s third-largest stakeholder. Shares of Trump Media have more than doubled in 2024. However, the company’s losses rise exponentially every year and its debt continues to soar. Why are shares of Chewy under pressure? As with other Gill investments, he had been dropping potential hints on X. In early September, he posted an image from the “Toy Story” film franchise of a child dropping a toy with the face of a dog superimposed on its head. Chewy uses dogs in a lot of its marketing materials. Gill has not posted to the account since. How is the company Chewy doing? In its most recent quarter, Chewy topped Wall Street earnings expectations and its revenue rose 2.
Shares of Chewy are up almost 13% this year, better than the Dow Jones Industrial Average but far below year-to-date advances on the S&P 500. Industry analysts are raising projections for Chewy’s profits and most see sales growth accelerating next year. How has the environment for meme stocks changed? Meme-stock companies now have more shares trading in the market than in 2021, reducing the chances of a ‘short squeeze’. A short squeeze is a rare event that can bring eye-popping profits. Investors short a stock by borrowing and selling shares when they bet the price will go down. Later, if the price falls, short sellers can buy the stock, return the borrowed shares and pocket the difference.
In March 2024, GameStop experienced a significant increase in market activity, with approximately 305.9 million shares trading, more than four times the number in March 2021. This surge in trading volume has made it more challenging to influence GameStop’s stock price solely through momentum.
A short squeeze was a contributing factor to GameStop’s remarkable rise in 2021. However, the SEC’s staff noted that it accounted for only a small portion of overall purchases, and GameStop’s stock price remained elevated even after short sellers had exited their positions.
