Shares of GameStop Corp. GME,
Friday afternoon, a recent rise extended, putting the video game retailer on track for its best monthly profit, up more than 220% in its history. The historic rise in the company’s stock, which went public in 2002, is as an army of traders on a popular social platform Reddit has sought to drive values up, even as a short-seller, according to a Bloomberg report. Citron Research has tried to show why appraisals for GameStop are more likely to sell than buy. However, a scheduled livestream hosted by Citron, originally intended for Wednesday, has been canceled and Citron has complained about ‘hacking’ its livestream events and his Twitter account recently. A report in Bloomberg News referred to Citron’s technical problems as a backlash from the Reddit community that is wildly optimistic about GameStop. GameStop’s stock originally started a parabolic rise last week and the rise was attributed by some to a short squeeze, forcing investors who bet the stock price will fall in value to buy stocks they borrowed in their bearish betting, which can have the effect of amplifying the rise in the share. Market participants also see the GameStop rally as evidence of the emergence of a bubble in market segments, with the Federal Reserve and the government providing liquidity and support for the COVID-19 affected financial market and maintaining interest rates at or near 0% – a recipe that bears have said has encouraged speculative investment. GameStop has had a powerful run due to lockdowns intended to limit COVID spread, with more people playing video games. The current rise in January far exceeds the 66% rise in August, the second-best monthly rise to date, data from FactSet shows.