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From GameStop to Chewy – The Roaring Kitty Effect is Real
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Have you heard of Keith Gill, also called Keith’ Roaring Kitty’ Gill? The name might ring a bell if you remember the GameStop price-spike case that happened during 2020-2. And if you still fail to recall, we will delve deeper soon.
But, before that, this is to remind you that Roaring Kitty is Gill’s YouTube channel and – also – his X handle. The channel has close to 1 million subscribers, while the X handle has 1.6 million followers! What do these numbers suggest? If not anything, it indicates that whatever Keith Gill had to say through his social media channels received a certain audience and viewership!
Now, let us go back a few years and look into the GameStop case and Keith Gill’s role.
What was the GameStop Controversy all about?
Many market analysts and trade experts term the GameStop stock trading episode ‘unprecedented.’ For the first time in recent history, one could see market participants organizing collective action ‘openly yet anonymously.’
To recount briefly: from January 13th, 2021, Gamestop shares started witnessing a sudden and drastic price surge. The returns were volatile.
The traction GameStop gained could eventually be traced back to an increase in retail trading by Robinhood Financial Platform users. Although the chatter was organized through social media and a significant role was played by the WallStreetBets chat forum on Reddit, there was an entity whose role was particularly pivotal in all these. That was Keith Gill.
Keith joined X, erstwhile Twitter, in 2014 and started posting on YouTube in 2015. His videos and live streams revolved around his daily tracking of stocks and performing investment research. Gill became an active Reddit member in 2019 and started routinely sharing his views and opinions in the WallStreetBets community under the handle called ‘DFV.’
