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An Update on Market Volatility

blog.robinhood.com

81–90 of 137 posts

Re: An Update on Market Volatility

#81
I closed some of my positions in these volatile stocks at a small loss because I had no faith that the people in charge would actually let people buy and sell the stocks they wanted to. I didn't lose much, but it feels bad knowing that I only lost because people in power used their influence to protect other people in power at the expense of the average retail investor. I was perfectly willing to accept the risk of owning a small amount of volatile shares. Now, Robinhood is saying they'll open up trading to an extent. I wish wall street would play by a consistent set of rules. I'm definitely not being protected by their heavy handed interventions.

Re: An Update on Market Volatility

#82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mark my words - Robinhood is going to be fine and it will have negligible impact. They have a strong product and better than anyone else in the market as a mobile app.

How are they going to deal with the fact half of their reviews on Google Play are 1 star, and their average is now 1.x star? Google isn't going to bend over backwards for them to delete legitimate user reviews.

Review recency matters in both app stores, AFAIK. It'll end up back wherever it would normally be as the review bomb ages out.

Re: An Update on Market Volatility

#83
post #4

Too little too late as far as brand reputation. Feels like #DeleteUber on steroids.

Mark my words - Robinhood is going to be fine and it will have negligible impact. They have a strong product and better than anyone else in the market as a mobile app.

If it's true half their current user base is long on GME I can't see it not having much impact. Not that handling them today better would have saved them from all the impending fury of people losing big on the way down anyway.

Whatever they said was going to be ignored by people still furiously insisting that Melvin Capital lied about closing their position yesterday, but you'd have thought they could have got that statement out faster than the rumours too.

Re: An Update on Market Volatility

#84

We're in a bubble that's being used instrumentally in a game of chicken between average joe with RH account and hedge funds on their short positions. There's more to gain from this because of the social aspect (social change and reform), but also more to lose (bubble bursting on the average citizen that has more to lose personally than a fund). I'm obviously not cheering for the funds here, but I do worry for people…

> but I do worry for people like my dad who can just buy a stock more easily than order dinner. I can't wrap my head around this argument at all. Why can't you trust your dad about his stock purchases? Yes, someone like your dad can buy a stock easily. They can also lose all their money at a casino or buy a lottery ticket easily. They can spend all their money on gadgets or fancy clothes. They can drink too much alco…

> Why can't you trust your dad about his stock purchases?

It's not the stock purchases in themselves. It's the degree to which certain stocks are hyped, largely by misinformation and traditional bubble mechanics, that's particularly insidious here. There's a reason why pump-and-dump schemes are traditionally regulated by securities laws.

Re: An Update on Market Volatility

#85
post #18

We're in a bubble that's being used instrumentally in a game of chicken between average joe with RH account and hedge funds on their short positions. There's more to gain from this because of the social aspect (social change and reform), but also more to lose (bubble bursting on the average citizen that has more to lose personally than a fund). I'm obviously not cheering for the funds here, but I do worry for people…

Only invest what you can afford to loose

- Does this advice apply to stocks?

- Does this advice apply to foreign currencies?

- Does this advice apply to local currencies?

See the contradiction? You're always invested.

Re: An Update on Market Volatility

#86
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only invest what you can afford to loose

Seems like common sense, but I am willing to bet average joe RH investor does not have the financial hygiene to appreciate that fact enough.

A simple disclaimer "We're not responsible if you get wiped out!" with another popup "Are you really sure you want to proceed?" after pressing ok twice would suffice before placing a bet. Who are we fooling? This damage control operation was to benefit their friends.

Re: An Update on Market Volatility

#87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am imagining their platform isn't that robust and it was the easiest way they had to shut it down temporarily.

RH doesn't know who's buying on margin? That's also not my problem as a RH user that's not buying on margin.

Sure. I think there is a lot of incompetence at play here.

Re: An Update on Market Volatility

#88
post #80

I'm honestly confused. I'm seeing a lot of rage in these threads. More than I'd expect. I understand not liking the hedge funds, and wanting to "stick it to the man" in some way, but it seems like more is going on here. Nobody is buying GME long at $400. The price is crazy. GameStop's business is selling used hard copies and leaning into customer dissatisfaction. It's a clear bubble and people are going to be hurt wh…

You're not missing anything, pyramid scheme at the expense of latecomers, Robinhood or otherwise.

Re: An Update on Market Volatility

#89

This is extremely suspect. If you take my money, and give me a share, in theory I should be the only one exposed to a loss (assuming no leverage). Unless you're doing something else with my money or my shares. I'm sure many people are buying on leverage, but that doesn't explain why they can't just limit margin buying vs preventing any purchase of the stock.

That's the abstraction that gets presented to the end-user but it's not how it works under the hood. When trades occur money doesn't change hands immediately, settlement only occurs two days later. The clearing houses require the brokerages to post collateral to ensure that they have the money required to settle the trades. When volatility goes up the clearing houses demand more collateral to deal with the higher risk. If the brokerage doesn't want to post the collateral the clearing houses won't let them trade.

Re: An Update on Market Volatility

#90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The social movement is honorable I’m gonna disagree. The entire “social movement” seems to be little more than the same tired old cliches and hysterics about “speculators”. The main grievance is basically that short selling is bad. Despite academic finance, finding again and again that short selling meaningfully improves price efficiency and protects ordinary investors from bubbles and mania.[1][2] Again and again…

The part that is "honorable" about the social movement, for me at least, is that the sheer exposure of the shenanigans that wall street carries out, coupled with the challenging of status quo power structures (institutional vs. retail, special accredited status vs. joe on RH), has the potential to lead to general reform and positive changes. I think you're too quick to defend short selling as purely good, just as eve…

Can anyone in this social movement articulate what exactly those “shenanigans” are and provide evidence that they’re occurring.

Not that there aren’t well founded criticisms of the financial industry. But as far as I see WSB appears to have zero overlap with any of them. All I see are gross inaccuracies (“short interest over 100% means they were naked short”) and zero-evidence QAnon like conspiracy theories about hedge funds colluding to shit down Robinhood.

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