'It seems Occupy Wall Street had the wrong approach': The man who created Reddit's WallStreetBets is a Mexico City father of twins who says GameStop shares mania is like 'watching a train wreck in real time'
The man who created Reddit's WallStreetBets is a Mexico City father of twins who says the GameStop shares mania is 'like watching a train wreck in real time'.
Jaime Rogozinski, 39, told The Wall Street Journal: 'It's a little like watching one of those horror films where you can see the bad guy slowly going up the stairs.
'You see this train wreck happening in real time.'
Members of his Reddit forum spearheaded the campaign to drive up GameStop shares in a battle against hedge fund short-sellers.
He earlier tweeted: 'It seems Occupy Wall Street had the wrong approach.'
Rogozinski, who lives with his physician wife and their three-year-old children, said he started the page as an alternative to forums where he was told his investment ideas were 'too risky'.
One his early subscribers was 'Pharma Bro' Martin Shkreli. He was sentenced to seven years in federal prison in March 2018 for securities fraud for lying to investors in his hedge funds and manipulating shock shared for his company, Retrophin Inc.
The site grew quickly after 2019 when Fidelity Investments and Charles Schwab Corp. eliminated trading commissions.
Now the three million strong group of amateur investors on his forum exchange tips and boast about beating 'the system'. Some analysts have described the situation as a 'nerds vs Wall Street' battle.
Jaime Rogozinski created the Reddit forum which spearheaded the campaign to drive up GameStop shares in a battle against hedge fund short-sellers. He lives with his wife, pictured, and their two young children in Mexico City
The site grew quickly after 2019 when Fidelity Investments and Charles Schwab Corp. eliminated trading commissions. Now the three million strong group of amateur investors on his forum exchange tips and boast about beating 'the system'
Rogozinski earlier tweeted: 'It seems Occupy Wall Street had the wrong approach'
Rogozinski, who works as a consultant, added: 'A lot of other places that discuss trading are really pretentious. At WallStreetBets it's both, 'Look at my money!' but also 'Look at all this money I lost,' and I think that's what's refreshing to people.
'A massive group of people have organized where they collectively have a seat at the poker table, which was previously invite-only. You can't ignore them anymore.'
He said the movement 'is able to do what Occupy Wall Street was never able to do but on a completely different angle.'
'Occupy Wall Street was fed up with this saying 'It's a game we can't play, you're forgetting the little guy.' Now the little guy figured out a different way around it,' he said.
But he also admitted facing moderation issues on the site, adding: 'I have really thick skin and people can say whatever they want to me, but at some point there’s a moral standpoint—like with my kids, I don’t want them to think, ‘Well, they can say whatever they want about you'.'
Members of his Reddit forum spearheaded the campaign to drive up GameStop shares in a battle against hedge fund short-sellers
The WallStreetBets forum had restricted access to those outside its 3.6 million subscribers for a few hours Wednesday evening, but was again visible to the public by 0115 GMT early Thursday.
Followers have been on a GameStop buying spree, which not only pushes up the shares but puts pressure on short sellers to make purchases to 'cover' their bets to avoid steeper losses.
This is known on Wall Street as a 'short squeeze' and can result in a dizzying rally by forcing short sellers into becoming buyers.
Rogozinski, who works as a consultant, said the movement 'is able to do what Occupy Wall Street was never able to do but on a completely different angle'
As a result, GameStop surged 18 percent on Monday, another 115 percent Tuesday and had leapt 135 percent Wednesday. That followed a stunning 50 percent jump on Friday.
The extreme volatility has raised concerns about manipulation, which could lead to an investigation by stock market regulators, and has even drawn attention from the White House.
Late Wednesday, the Securities and Exchange Commission said it was monitoring the activity.
GameStop shares plunged on Thursday after trading app Robinhood restricted purchases.
By noon, a federal class action lawsuit had been filed against the trading app in the Southern District of New York.
Robinhood also halted buying for shares of theater chain AMC, BlackBerry, retailers Express and Bed Bath & Beyond, headphone maker Koss, swimwear line Naked Brand Group, and Nokia. All were down by double digits in midday trading.
GameStop shares plunged on Thursday after trading app Robinhood restricted purchases. By noon, a federal class action lawsuit had been filed against the trading app in the Southern District of New York
Robinhood also halted buying for shares of theater chain AMC, BlackBerry, retailers Express and Bed Bath & Beyond, headphone maker Koss, swimwear line Naked Brand Group, and Nokia. All were down by double digits in midday trading
GOP Senator Ted Cruz and Democrat Squad member Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez have both called for investigations and criticized Robinhood for shutting down trades while hedge funds are still free to buy and sell stocks as they please.
The war began last week when famed hedge fund short seller Andrew Left of Citron Capital bet against GameStop and was met with a barrage of retail traders betting the other way. He said on Wednesday he had abandoned the bet.
The Redditers have taken advantage of a process called 'short selling', which effectively reverses the way the stock market traditionally works.
Instead of buying a stock in the hope company does well and the price goes up, then selling for a profit, shorting involves betting against a stock in the hope the value goes down, and then pocketing a share of the difference.
The catch is that, if the investors are wrong and the price actually goes up, they will end up losing potentially huge sums of money, depending on how far the price rises.
Rogozinski, who lives with his physician wife, pictured, and their three-year-old children, said he started the page as an alternative to forums where he was told 'it's too risky'
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