During that same period in January, AMC surged from about $3 to a high of $20, and Blackberry doubled from about $12 to $25. Alex Kearns died by suicide last summer, after his Robinhood brokerage account appeared to show a negative balance of about $730,000. The wide-ranging hearing stretched over five hours and also featured testimony from Citadel CEO Ken Griffin, Melvin Capital CEO Gabriel Plotkin, Reddit co-founder Steve Huffman and Keith Gill, the trader known as “Roaring Kitty” on YouTube who helped set off the stock frenzy. The Actual Figure May Be in the Trillions. asked the chief executive of Robinhood about the death of a 20-year-old customer last year. For the virtual hearing of the House Committee on Financial Services, Gill wore a jacket and tie, although the headband could be seen hanging on a poster of a kitten with the words "Hang in There!" By February, those stocks all nosedived. Welcome to our live coverage of the GameStop hearing in front of the House of Representatives’ financial services committee. While I may be the only panelist here today who had faith in GameStop, I was hardly the only person who advocated these points or ones like them. Lawmakers touched on everything from a Robinhood competitor’s Chinese ties to whether the practice of short-selling should face new federal regulation. On January 28, 2021 GameStop hit an intraday peak of $483, bringing its run from a share price of $18.84 on December 31, 2020 — a gain of 2,465 percent for a struggling brick and mortar retail outlet that sells video games. Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev won’t reveal what rate of return customers have seen on their investments through the app. The kickoff begins this Thursday with the Committee’s third hearing on the wild trading action in shares of GameStop and other meme stocks. Mr. Martens' career spanned four decades in printing and publishing management. Later this week, the House Committee on Financial Services will hold a hearing addressing the GameStop trading phenomenon. New hype baby!” one user said, highlighting the excitement of seeing one’s own subculture reflected through the prism of national media. This is definitely going to be a hearing you won’t want to miss if you care about cleaning up the deeply enmeshed oligarchy on Wall Street. Here’s Why. The Fed’s Ongoing Emergency Loan Operations to Wall Street’s Trading Firms Began on September 17, 2019 – Months Before the Coronavirus COVID-19 Had Emerged in China or Anywhere Else in the World. Kearns had repeatedly contacted Robinhood’s customer support team, thinking that he was facing an enormous loss. The House Financial Services Committee is showing a decidedly gutsy streak under the Chairmanship of Congresswoman Maxine Waters. GameStop wasn’t the only stock investors on Reddit’s r/WallStreetBets targeted. The Honorable Gary Gensler, Chairman, U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission H.R. And we have vowed to take a series of steps, very aggressive steps to make our options products safer for our customers.”. House committee holds hearing on GameStop 01:50. By embracing the digital economy, GameStop can pursue new revenues streams including larger gaming catalogs, digital content and community experiences, online trade-ins, streaming services, and Esports. But the share price stumbled after brokerage firms restricted users from buying more shares. H.R. Archegos: Wall Street Was Effectively Giving 85 Percent Margin Loans on Concentrated Stock Positions – Thwarting the Fed’s Reg T and Its Own Margin Rules. Over the next few weeks, it added more than 6 million, with nearly half joining between Jan. 27 and Jan. 29, when the video game retailer’s stock reached $347.51 per share, the highest closing price in company history. All three major stock market indexes fell Thursday, following a disappointing jobs report from the Labor Department that showed the number of new unemployment claims last week rose slightly to 861,000, as the pandemic continues to batter the U.S. economy. On Thursday GameStop … The spirited and contentious GameStop hearing seemed to freeze in time when Rep. Emanuel Cleaver II (D-Mo.) AMC’s gains were relatively more restrained but it still hit a high of over $20 from a 52-week low of under 2 bucks. Tenev said on the contrary, the need to meet “increased regulatory deposit requirements” drove the move. WallStreetBets, the Reddit forum at the center of the GameStop stock rally, saw an explosive growth in new users last month. Ms. Martens is a former Wall Street veteran with a background in journalism. The chiefs of … This would not be the first time that the DTCC was accused of turning a blind eye to market manipulations. But /r/wallstreetbets has continued to grow and had 9.1 million users as of today. H.R. And I’ll make sure.”. GameStop Hearing, Part 2. Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Gary Gensler, sworn … Keith Gill, a day-trading suburban dad, may look out of place next to his fellow speakers at Thursday’s hearing, which was slated to feature a billionaire hedge fund founder and two visionary tech entrepreneurs. FINRA is also where trade reporting and data dissemination occurs for a tiny sliver of light on trading in Wall Street’s Dark Pools – which we previously explained were actively engaged in trading the shares of GameStop during its big upward spike. Oh, Gensler’s pick as his crime fighting boss, had spent the last two decades at Big Law firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, the law firm that major Wall Street banks repeatedly choose to fight their serial fraud charges. It's because it's good for customers,” and allows them to trade for free. Allowing the Clearing Agencies to avoid accountability for this conduct through the preemption defense deprives the Investors of a chance for redress. The spirited and contentious GameStop hearing seemed to freeze in time when Rep. Emanuel Cleaver II (D-Mo.) HEARING BEFORE THE UNITED STATES HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES COMMITTEE ON FINANCIAL SERVICES February 18, 2021 Testimony of Vladimir Tenev Robinhood Markets, Inc. May 06 ICYMI: McHenry Joins Squawk Box Ahead of Committee’s Third GameStop Hearing. “At the end of the day, what happened is unacceptable,” Tenev said in his opening statement. I apologize,” he said. “Everyday investors do not get the same transparency,” Foster said. ____, the "Capital Markets Engagement and Transparency Act of 2021." “You're not making as much on the transaction,” Sherman said. Legislation. At the start of the year, GameStop was among the most highly targeted companies by short sellers — investors and funds who bet against a company and are rewarded when its stock price falls. His background featured a poster of a kitten draped with his signature red headband. Even though users of online brokerages such as Robinhood charge no fees for stock trading, Sherman was asking about whether its users ended up paying a hidden fee because of the way Citadel Securities prioritizes some trades over others. The initial drop triggered waves of selling and put an end to the extreme climb. H.R. But AMC, BlackBerry and GameStop are all still up by at least 60 percent in 2021. GameStop began its astounding run in January, ballooning from about $39 to $348 at its peak. Users and critics of the trading app have speculated it choked off trading to protect hedge funds that had bet against the surging stocks. GameStop shares finished the day down 11 percent, setting a new low for the month and continuing its slide from the astronomical heights of January. The hearing focused almost solely on GameStop. But it’s more complicated than that. Sherman lost his patience with the billionaire hedge fund executive during an exchange about the business model of “free” online trading apps. Witnesses. Shades of 2008: Derivative Bets Blow Up Archegos Hedge Fund; Inflict Billions in Losses on Global Banks, Where’s Gary Gensler? Since then the stock has tumbled. On April 28, Alex Young K. Oh abruptly resigned her post as Director of Enforcement at the SEC after just six days in office. Prior to the current chair Gensler, its past two Chairs have come straight from legally defending the biggest banks on Wall Street as outside counsel. At the hearing titled "Game Stopped? For the unluckiest traders who bought at the very top, that represents a potential loss of 87 percent. In his response, Griffin confirmed that “the execution varies by the channel of the order.” He compared this to a large bank such as JP Morgan charging different interest rates to different types of customers. The U.S. House Financial Services and Senate Banking committees said on … A 20-year-old died by suicide, thinking he'd lost $730,000 on Robinhood. GameStop’s improbable run has catapulted its stock to astronomical heights — rising as much as 1,745 percent for the year — propelled in part by ordinary investors, spurred by a Reddit message board and other online trading communities, looking to show up the giants of Wall Street and turn a bold gamble into a fortune.