UPDATE—May 13, 2024: This article has been updated to include information about additional social media posts by Keith Gill, trading halts, and more recent stock price values.
Key Takeaways
- GameStop shares were halted from trading multiple times due to volatility Monday morning after shares soared following a post on X by trader Keith Gill.
- Keith Gill, known by his online persona of “Roaring Kitty,” was a key driver of the 2020 meme stock craze, and posted to social media for the first time in nearly three years Sunday night.
- Gill released two more posts Monday morning featuring short videos that nodded to his absence and return.
- GameStop’s stock price was still well below the levels it reached in early 2021 as of 11:45 a.m. ET Monday, but has more than doubled in value from the start of May.
GameStop (GME) shares were halted from trading multiple times due to volatility Monday morning after the meme stock soared with the online return of Keith Gill, who was a key driver of the stock’s surge in late 2020 and early 2021.
GameStop shares jumped over 90% shortly after markets opened Monday, with no apparent reason to anyone who is not familiar with the meme stock frenzy of late 2020 and early 2021.
The mid-pandemic surge that has been immortalized in documentaries and movies was fueled by waves of trading from an online community of retail traders, driven by a few key figures. One of those was Keith Gill, who is known in the online trading community by a number of different usernames, including “Roaring Kitty” on his YouTube and X accounts.
On Sunday evening, Gill posted to his X account for the first time in nearly three years, returning to the digital world with a meme of a person playing video games leaning forward in his chair, indicating that the player is taking the game more seriously.
Gill also released two more posts Monday morning, each with short videos that used clips from Marvel movies, along with famous scenes from “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” and “Breaking Bad.” The videos nodded to Gill’s absence and return with quotes including “Breaking Bad” character Walter White saying, “we’re done when I say we’re done.”
Who Is Keith ‘Roaring Kitty’ Gill?
Gill was a key player in the meme stock craze of 2020 and 2021, rising to prominence because of his substantial bets on GameStop as the stock was soaring. Gill’s enthusiasm over the stock drove the online excitement along with other figures, including activist investor Ryan Cohen, who worked his way to the GameStop board and was named Chief Executive Officer (CEO) last year.
He was a streamer who made a bet, buying $53,000 worth of GameStop shares in 2019, after learning about the investing world and becoming convinced that the retailer was undervalued. At the peak of the meme stock surge, Gill’s position was worth an estimated $48 million.
The streamer eventually said goodbye to his online persona, last posting to YouTube and X (then Twitter) in 2021.
How Is the Online Retail Trading Community Reacting?
Users of the WallStreetBets subreddit, the online community that was central to the GameStop surge of 2020, expressed excitement about Gill’s return, with a number of top posts on the forum about Gill’s post or GameStop’s price as of Monday morning.
GameStop and the company’s stock symbol, GME, were each trending on X Monday morning, with many users celebrating Gill’s return and posting about their investments into the stock.
GameStop shares were up close to 62% at 11:45 a.m. Monday to $28.24, still well below the all-time high of $120.75 they reached on Jan. 28, 2021, but more than double the roughly $11 mark where they started the month.