Episode Synopsis
Most of you will have heard about GameStop. Early in 2021, shares in a fledgling company on it’s way to oblivian suddenly began to climb against all of Wall Street’s expectations. Many Hedge Funds bet against the stock, but Redditors had other ideas. In this podcast we explore the stories, characters; winners and losers behind what was undoubtadly a middle finger to the institutions of Wall Street. In his latest book, Ben Mezrich chronicles the drama as it unfolded, in the biggest f@$% you in financial history.
‘On Wall Street if you get into a position and it gets screwed, you just get out and go home to your million dollar mansion. But if a regular guy throws all his money in and loses, he’s kind of screwed. You don’t get that money back and you don’t move on to the next thing.”
Ben Mezrich
About Ben Mezrich:
Ben Mezrich is the multiple New York Times Best Selling Author, the most notable being Accidental Billionaires – which inspired the the Oscar winning film – The Social Network. He’s famed for bringing to life the stories and lives of those behind the biggests shifts in popular culture. His latest book, The Anti-Social Network, chronicles the characters behind the GameStop saga, where thousands of people in a Reddit community pumped money into a stock that Wall Street had decided was going to fail… causing it to do the opposite.
Connect with Ben:
Further Resources:
- TIMELINE: What happened to GameStop
- VIDEO: What happened to GameStop, and what is a short squeeze?
- Melvin Capital – the hedge fund that Redditors went to war with
- Backlash as Robinhood suspend trading on GameStop
- Glossary of Trading Terms
- The Basics of Short Selling
- What is a Short Squeeze?
- Day trading and how to get started