GameStop shares are surging – stop us if you’ve heard that somewhere before.
The trend from Wednesday rolled smoothly into Thursday, with the mercurial stock more than tripling over the past couple of days.
At noon ET, GameStop shares were trading at $139 after reaching $158 in pre-market action, up significantly from the $91 closing price on Wednesday.
The roller-coaster ride is largely the product of moves executed by amateur investors via Reddit’s WallStreetBets message board.
They were at it again and, Thursday morning, there were discussions about trying to push the stock to $800, a number that Reddit users say could trigger “the mother of all short squeezes.”
Other favorites of the amateur investor/social media crowd also rose on the enthusiasm. Headphone maker Koss which climbed 85% before markets opened Thursday and AMC entertainment was up 16%.
“I am not certain that there’s another short squeeze going on like the one before. However, there are probably some funds who stayed short assuming the dust would settle,” said Gust Kepler, CEO of stocks and options platform BlackBoxStocks, in a CBS News story.
There is evidence that GameStop’s eye toward the future is contributing.
The Grapevine, Texas-based company announced Wednesday that its chief financial officer Jim Bell will resign March 26.
“The CFO exited the company and there’s talk of the company finally transforming from a brick and mortar to deploying their product in a digital way, and this is why we believe the stock shot up at the end of the day today,” Kepler said.
Reports suggested that Ryan Cohen – GameStop investor and co-founder of online pet food retailer Chewy — and the board forced the move to accelerate its transition online.
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