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WallStreetBets vs WallStreet: It's not about the money anymore

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121–130 of 475 posts

Re: WallStreetBets vs WallStreet: It's not about the money anymore

#121

Once again, this insistence on viewing 'Wall Street' as a monolothic entity. The largest asset management firm on Earth holds over 9 million Gamestop stock, none of the big banks that received bailouts in 08 are affected by this, 99.9% of hedge funds are not affected by this, high frequency traders are probably making a bundle. Institutional money was long Gamestop before this story entered the public consciousness.…

I was wondering if this was really a pump and dump made to look like a short squeeze. Now I'm 100% convinced that this is what it is. All those people buying a couple hundred shares via Robinhood are going to lose their shirts.

Re: WallStreetBets vs WallStreet: It's not about the money anymore

#122

Once again, this insistence on viewing 'Wall Street' as a monolothic entity. The largest asset management firm on Earth holds over 9 million Gamestop stock, none of the big banks that received bailouts in 08 are affected by this, 99.9% of hedge funds are not affected by this, high frequency traders are probably making a bundle. Institutional money was long Gamestop before this story entered the public consciousness.…

>the market has rightfully taught them a lesson Has it? What leads you to believe that THIS is the time investment firms will stop being reckless?

Where did I say that? They've been taught a lesson via losing a lot of money, and now they know will be a lot of eyeballs on any future trades of a similar nature.

Re: WallStreetBets vs WallStreet: It's not about the money anymore

#123

Once again, this insistence on viewing 'Wall Street' as a monolothic entity. The largest asset management firm on Earth holds over 9 million Gamestop stock, none of the big banks that received bailouts in 08 are affected by this, 99.9% of hedge funds are not affected by this, high frequency traders are probably making a bundle. Institutional money was long Gamestop before this story entered the public consciousness.…

How is disabling purchases and broker-wide outages not bolstering hedge funds? It's government intervention no matter how you look at it. Just because it's not a direct capital infusion does not make it any less bad

How is disabling purchases and broker-wide outages not bolstering hedge funds?

There are hedge funds on both sides of this bet. So this intervention is both helping and harming "hedge funds" in equal measure depending on what side they have taken.

Re: WallStreetBets vs WallStreet: It's not about the money anymore

#124
post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody is gambling money away. The sentiment is that they are knowingly _throwing_ it away to send a message.

So you're saying they're even dumber than they appear at first glance? Sorry, but pissing money away (or actually likely giving it to some Wall Street institution) to send some ill-defined "message" really can't be called anything but dumb.

Even as an econometrician, I would never call it dumb. It's a virtual incarnation of Occupy Wall Street. These guys are probably spending less than those who protested several years ago did. Heck, you can buy a stock and still go to work. No need to forego weeks of labor.

Re: WallStreetBets vs WallStreet: It's not about the money anymore

#125

Once again, this insistence on viewing 'Wall Street' as a monolothic entity. The largest asset management firm on Earth holds over 9 million Gamestop stock, none of the big banks that received bailouts in 08 are affected by this, 99.9% of hedge funds are not affected by this, high frequency traders are probably making a bundle. Institutional money was long Gamestop before this story entered the public consciousness.…

Sure, but Gabe Plotkin is the uber-wallstreeter. All the rich-but-average Chosen Ones who get internships because of mommy and daddy look at what guys like him accomplish and think, "someday that too can be mine."

This is like that scene in 300 where Leonidas makes Xerxes bleed. The point isn't that Wall Street has fallen. It's that, for once, Wall Street is fallible.

Re: WallStreetBets vs WallStreet: It's not about the money anymore

#126

Once again, this insistence on viewing 'Wall Street' as a monolothic entity. The largest asset management firm on Earth holds over 9 million Gamestop stock, none of the big banks that received bailouts in 08 are affected by this, 99.9% of hedge funds are not affected by this, high frequency traders are probably making a bundle. Institutional money was long Gamestop before this story entered the public consciousness.…

How is disabling purchases and broker-wide outages not bolstering hedge funds? It's government intervention no matter how you look at it. Just because it's not a direct capital infusion does not make it any less bad

[deleted]

Re: WallStreetBets vs WallStreet: It's not about the money anymore

#127

They are blocking buying, and only allowing selling GME, BB and others. How is this not evidence of a corrupted free market system? A CEO of one company can call up his connections in retail trading platform firms, CNBC, and Nasdaq and protect his profits? Why is Reddit the scandal and not that? Reddit is full of rocket emojis and YOLO jokes. But what we see here, especially with the moralizing about gambling, is an…

What I don't understand, is why the only candidate that would really do something about this, from either party (Bernie), doesn't get a look in by "the people". The same people who are sick of it also shout "socialist" at the people who want to change things. Slugs voting for salt.

Re: WallStreetBets vs WallStreet: It's not about the money anymore

#128
post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody is gambling money away. The sentiment is that they are knowingly _throwing_ it away to send a message.

Are we talking about cutting your own nose off to spite someone else's face?

Is that any different to taking a day off work to go to a protest? Both situations have you losing money in order to bring issues to light. Same with union workers going on strike.

Re: WallStreetBets vs WallStreet: It's not about the money anymore

#129

Once again, this insistence on viewing 'Wall Street' as a monolothic entity. The largest asset management firm on Earth holds over 9 million Gamestop stock, none of the big banks that received bailouts in 08 are affected by this, 99.9% of hedge funds are not affected by this, high frequency traders are probably making a bundle. Institutional money was long Gamestop before this story entered the public consciousness.…

> high frequency traders are probably making a bundle. I've heard from a former colleague at a major HFT firm, that they hit their entire revenue target for the year, just in the past week.

What kind of self-respecting HFT firm has revenue targets? Surely you're talking about P&L.

Re: WallStreetBets vs WallStreet: It's not about the money anymore

#130

As someone who is not very educated in finance, I'm curious how to interpret today's events. Is nasdaq/robinhood/everyone else transparently manipulating the market on behalf of hedge funds? Or are these standard mechanisms in place for preventing the stock market from swinging wildly out of control? I don't know if it's standard to completely block trading on one or more stocks.

WSB has basically recreated a "boiler room", which is an ages old scam where a small group of insiders would encourage people to buy stock, drive them value up, and then the insiders dump the stock. The key insight here is that for every person selling the stock and making millions, somoene has to be buying. There's a narrative about short squeezes forcing a small number of hedge funds to buy stock, but in practice m…

Thats not the same narrative I see on reddit. People are okay with losing as long as the big sharks are hit hard. It seems like an emotional reaction not a boiler room
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