Ken Griffin
Lucy Nicholson | Reuters
Ken Griffin, the billionaire CEO of hedge fund Citadel, defended his $ 2 billion investment in short-seller Gabe Plotkin’s Melvin Capital last month during the height of the GameStop mania.
“No, I think Gabe Plotkin is one of the best investors of his generation,” Griffin told CNBC’s Andrew Ross Sorkin at Squawk Box on Friday.
The comment was in response to a question from Sorkin about whether Griffin’s investment was a mistake, as it raised questions about Griffin’s motivation to back Plotkin amid his battle with Reddit merchants who bought GameStop’s stock. were pumping.
“If I had to run my business based on the possibility that an insane conspiracy theory would emerge at some point, I would have no business,” Griffin said.
In addition to running hedge fund Citadel, Griffin is the founder of dominant market maker Citadel Securities, which handles approximately 40% of US inventory order flows, including from brokers such as the free trading app Robinhood.
After news of the Citadel and Point72 investment came out, there was much speculation on social media platforms about Griffin’s possible role in the unfolding drama. In a now-deleted tweet, Twitch co-founder Justin Kan said he “got a tip” that Griffin may have been involved in Robinhood’s attempt to restrict access to GameStop bulls.
Robinhood later explained that it was his clearinghouse, a behind-the-scenes market player called the Depository Trust and Clearing Corporation, that had demanded billions of dollars in collateral to support GameStop transactions, forcing the brokerage to limit access for its users to it. be able to raise capital.
In the lengthy interview, Griffin also said there is “no doubt” that the amount of short selling will be reduced thanks to the power Reddit-fueled retailers demonstrated with GameStop.