TL;DR Breakdown
- Institutional investors played an active role in the stock rally of GameStop shares.
- Data from different sources have shown that retail investors only made gains during the early week of the rally.
Many believed that retail investors were responsible for the massive 700% surge of GameStop shares, with the subreddit group WallStreetBets taking most of the flak and the prestige that came with the stock rally. But is this claim really true or we have been made to think otherwise?
Institutional investors behind GameStop Stock price rise
Available data from JP Morgan shows that GameStop shares are not one of the most bought shares by retail investors recently. This is entirely surprising as the general belief was that the stocks were majorly purchased by retailers. However, in what appears to be a twist, it was revealed that the rallying of the GME stock was essentially backed by other institutional players.
Peng Cheng, a quantitative and derivatives strategy analyst with the bank stated that retail investors were not responsible for the stocks’ price rally. He went on to add that the intricate details of the price rallies we saw “might be more nuanced.”
While retail investors flooded social media pages advising other retailers to buy GME stocks, institutional investors apparently were the one who took the advice as they made silent moves in acquiring the stocks en masse. Another analyst with JP Morgan, Devin Ryan also stated that it wasn’t a case of “the little guy vs the big guy” as institutional investors also invested heavily in those stocks.
Retail investors cashed out early
CNBC has also reported that retail investors became net sellers of the stocks immediately after the early gains made in the week. Citadel Securities had provided data used for this report to the media house.
Data from Trade Reporting Facility (TRF) also confirmed that retailers were selling the stocks heavily after their early gains. This means that some institutional investors began to buy in on the stock before its value more than doubled.
A report from WSJ says that Senvest Management, a hedge fund in New York, made gains of $700 million from the GameStop shares.
