The Revolution That Wasn't: GameStop, Reddit, and the Fleecing of Small Investor

Description: FREE SHIPPING UK WIDE The Revolution That Wasn't by Spencer Jakab In January 2021, a motley crew of retail traders on Reddits r/wallstreetbets seemingly brought some of the biggest players on Wall Street to their knees. Their weapon was GameStop, a failing retailer whose shares briefly became the most-traded security on the planet and the subject of intense media coverage. The Revolution That Wasnt is the riveting story of how the meme stock squeeze unfolded, and of the real architects (and winners) of the GameStop rally. The surprising truth? What appeared to be a revolution that placed power back in the hands of everyday investors only tilted the odds further in the houses favour. FORMAT Hardcover LANGUAGE English CONDITION Brand New Author Biography Spencer Jakab is an award-winning financial journalist and a former top-rated stock analyst at Credit Suisse. He edits the Wall Street Journals "Heard on the Street" column and previously wrote the daily investing column "Ahead of the Tape." Prior to joining the Journal he wrote for the "Lex" and "On Wall Street" columns at Britains Financial Times. This is his second book. Review "A thrumming narrative… Anybody who buys and sells stocks, and anyone who "invests" in anything old or new, should read this book."--The LA Times"Spencer Jakab, a columnist at the Wall Street Journal, unknots the threads of this complex financial tale. His is a pacey and comprehensive account that takes in the structural changes in finance and the media that made the turmoil possible … the story is deftly told. If the first draft of history was not quite on the money, as Mr Jakab contends, his second go has set the record straight."--The Economist "Ever since the GameStop saga erupted into the headlines in the winter of 2021, weve all been waiting for the definitive take. Spencer Jakabs book is it. No matter how much you think you know about Wall Street, this book will surprise you, infuriate you – and educate you."--Bethany McLean, bestselling coauthor of The Smartest Guys in the Room and All the Devils are Here"Delightfully written illustrations of how "free" and gamified trading has contributed to frenzied stock market activity with some serious warnings about the dangers facing retail investors tempted to join the wild party. The saga of GameStop and other meme stocks is revealed with the skill of a thrilling whodunit. Jakab writes with an anti-Midas touch. If he touched gold, he would bring it to life."--Burton G. Malkiel, author of A Random Walk Down Wall Street"The Revolution That Wasnt is a gripping account of the social movement that took over the investing world in 2020. The heroes here thought they were sticking it to the man, but became the mans stick. The story is told with warmth and humor, making financial concepts accessible to a lay audience. You will be entertained."--Scott Galloway, Professor of Marketing at NYU Stern School of Business, and New York Times bestselling author of The Four and Post Corona"An important look at how markets -- and people -- defy prediction and occasionally lose their minds."--Morgan Housel, bestselling author of The Psychology of Money"Spencer Jakabs The Revolution That Wasnt is essential, riveting reading if you want to understand the collision of long and short-term factors that sparked the remarkable "meme stonk" frenzy of 2021. Jakab adeptly skewers the popular but dangerously wrong narrative of Reddits David thumping Wall Streets Goliath, and shows how the casino always wins in the end. DeepF***ingRespect for an important book with lessons far more durable than GameStops stock market levitation." --Robin Wigglesworth, author of Trillions"The real story of the GameStop short squeeze. Jakab walks us through every twist and turn with nuanced insight and sheds a clarifying light on the shifts happening in todays retail revolution."--Jaime Rogozinski, founder of Reddits WallStreetBets"A timely and hugely important book. Spencer Jakab is a top-drawer journalist who understands this industry inside out. I cant recommend this book highly enough." --Robin Powell, journalist, author and editor of The Evidence-Based Investor"Like a great mystery novel, Spencer expertly weaves the story of how things played out at different stages of this saga. Its a fascinating read!"--Mel Lindauer, co-author, The Bogleheads Guide to Investing and The Bogleheads Guide to Retirement Planning"An unputdownable post-mortem of the freakiest tale of pandemic-age finance – and of how investing became gamified. Jakab speaks with the key characters and highlights the structural issues, deploys the nihilistic "degen" jargon and recounts priceless anecdotes, cutting through the narrative to tell us what really happened during the GameStop short squeeze."--Gian M. Volpicelli, Senior Writer, Wired Review Quote "Ever since the GameStop saga erupted into the headlines in the winter of 2021, weve all been waiting for the definitive take. Spencer Jakabs book is it. No matter how much you think you know about Wall Street, this book will surprise you, infuriate you - and educate you." --Bethany McLean, bestselling coauthor of The Smartest Guys in the Room and All the Devils are Here "Delightfully written illustrations of how "free" and gamified trading has contributed to frenzied stock market activity with some serious warnings about the dangers facing retail investors tempted to join the wild party. The saga of GameStop and other meme stocks is revealed with the skill of a thrilling whodunit. Jakab writes with an anti-Midas touch. If he touched gold, he would bring it to life." --Burton G. Malkiel, author of A Random Walk Down Wall Street " The Revolution That Wasnt is a gripping account of the social movement that took over the investing world in 2020. The heroes here thought they were sticking it to the man, but became the mans stick. The story is told with warmth and humor, making financial concepts accessible to a lay audience. You will be entertained." --Scott Galloway, Professor of Marketing at NYU Stern School of Business, and New York Times bestselling author of The Four and Post Corona "Spencer Jakabs The Revolution That Wasnt is essential, riveting reading if you want to understand the collision of long and short-term factors that sparked the remarkable "meme stonk" frenzy of 2021. Jakab adeptly skewers the popular but dangerously wrong narrative of Reddits David thumping Wall Streets Goliath, and shows how the casino always wins in the end. DeepF***ingRespect for an important book with lessons far more durable than GameStops stock market levitation." --Robin Wigglesworth, author of Trillions Excerpt from Book Chapter 1 Mr. Kitty Goes to Washington Keith Gill "I am not a cat." So began the congressional testimony of an until recently middle-class, thirty-four-year-old financial wellness expert from the suburbs of Boston. His quip, a reference to a video of a virtual legal pleading that had gone viral a week earlier, injected a bit of levity into the serious proceedings, being conducted remotely on the afternoon of February 18, 2021, because of the still-raging COVID-19 pandemic. Unlike the hapless, tabby-faced lawyer, Keith Patrick Gill had more than enough tech savvy to disable a Zoom filter. He had recently come into a bit of money in the stock market-over $50 million at one point-and, indirectly at least, he had modern social media and trading apps that had radically lowered the bar for novice investors to thank for it. Even at his peak, that made him easily the poorest of the five men called to testify that day. Gill, who went by the name Roaring Kitty on a series of YouTube videos and by the screen name DeepFuckingValue on Reddits WallStreetBets forum, also was the sole man testifying at the virtual hearing who had become rich by risking only his personal capital. It was all earned through a concentrated bet on the stock of a single company that some of the brightest minds in finance were convinced was headed in the opposite direction: GameStop. It takes two to make a market, as they say. When Gill first made a fortune on paper and then hung on to most of his stake anyway, he became an overnight hero for an online social movement. Millions of people logged on to WallStreetBets each afternoon just to see if he had sold, and members vowed each time: If hes still in, Im still in! The revolutionaries couldnt all get rich or even make a profit in the process-though clearly many hadnt thought that part of the plan through-but they could transform themselves from hunted to hunter on Wall Street by collectively weaponizing their modest brokerage accounts. For some, sticking it to the man was just the gravy on top of the profit. For others, it had suddenly become their main goal, and they pledged to hang on even if it cost them money. They were surprised by just how successful they were as millions of people joined them over the course of one crazy week. But, just as the fat cats were in full panic mode, they got bailed out again when the rules of the game were changed. It was "heads we win, tails you lose," just like during the financial crisis. That was the popular narrative at least, and it was the reason Gill had to put on a suit and tie that morning. Vladimir Tenev The other men called as witnesses were wearing nicer suits and were giving their testimony from swanky offices, not the basement of a rented house with a poster of a kitten hanging on the wall. They had accumulated far greater fortunes than Gill, in large part by tapping into the eras gusher of venture capital or by profiting from the longer-standing practice of "helping" Americans invest and grow their savings. The one who would get the most questions that day from the House Committee on Financial Services, Vladimir Tenev, was the same age as Gill. Slim and pale with shoulder-length brown hair, he bore an uncommon resemblance to Adam Driver, with more than a touch of David Cassidy. Tenev had immigrated to the US from Bulgaria as a child shortly after the fall of its communist regime. As a boy, he was preoccupied with having money so that his family wouldnt get sent back and studied hard, majoring in math at Stanford. Tenev had become a billionaire three years earlier by harnessing both Silicon Valleys and Wall Streets money machines to start a company named for Robin Hood, the mythical figure who stole from the rich to give to the poor. But now he was the prime suspect in rigging the game for Wall Streets fat cats by restricting trading just as the squeeze had them on the ropes. Tenev started out his testimony by reading lines taken straight from his companys marketing materials about how "the financial system should be built to work for everyone," not just people with a lot of money. Committee chair Maxine Waters was in no mood to hear it, cutting Tenev off as he began and telling him to "use your limited time to talk directly to what happened January 28th and your involvement in it." That was the day three weeks earlier that had outraged everyone from leading politicians on both sides of the spectrum to late-night talk show hosts, making WallStreetBets a cause cZlbre. Although the committees members had accepted millions of dollars in political donations from the finance industry, sympathies clearly were with the little guy that day. There was just one problem: nobody had broken any rules. Moreover, as we shall explore later in these pages, there was no conspiracy between hedge funds and retail brokers to short-circuit a revolution. But one pundits quip that the hearing was a solution in search of a problem overlooked the big picture. It was a missed opportunity to lay bare for the public how a huge and hugely profitable business made its money from the savings of novice investors. For decades Americans have been forced to navigate a confusing maze of slick marketing messages from companies seeking to help them invest their money, often leading to poor and expensive choices. Compound interest isnt something that people grasp intuitively, but people like the late index-fund pioneer Jack Bogle had by then convinced tens of millions of savers that they were giving up a huge chunk of their potential nest eggs due to what seemed like inconsequential costs. Now, though, many stock-trading services like Robinhood were "free." So were real-time updates delivered straight to your smartphone and investing recommendations on social media that seemed to have worked out well lately. Index funds, on the other hand, were about as exciting as watching grass grow. A lot of the analysis and news feeds that cost professionals a fortune and had long given them an edge had now become available to the little guys, allowing them to compete with and even outsmart elite investors. That was the story, at least. But, if finance was being "democratized," why was Wall Street making more profit than ever? Had the hearings been called at some other point in time-say, in the aftermath of the dot-com bubbles bursting-people tuning in might have been more interested in how much of the stock markets return was accruing to them and how some of the men testifying that day had become so rich. But February 2021 was a moment in time when most Americans with investment accounts werent in the mood to check the fine print on their statements. Stocks were booming, and the people affected by the trading restrictions believed that they could do much better than just capturing the markets long-run return. They were Wall Streets ideal customers. Americans are almost entirely on their own when it comes to financing retirement and their childrens education. Those that take the crucial step of setting aside enough money for those goals often get their pockets picked along the way without realizing it. The meme-stock squeeze presented an excellent opportunity to ask some hard questions about how much of our savings wind up enriching Wall Street and what could be done to change the industrys incentives. A few of the statements made and questions asked by members of the committee got to that point. For example, Illinois representative Sean Casten had an uncomfortable observation as he addressed Tenev. "There is an innate tension in your business model, between democratizing finance, which is a noble calling, and being a conduit to feed fish to sharks." Another member asked Tenev if he should have seen the trading frenzy coming. Tenev called the meme-stock short squeeze a "black swan" event that had a one in 3.5 million chance of occurring. Maybe the former mathematics PhD students numbers were accurate, but a black swan, a term popularized by bestselling author and risk analyst Nassim Nicholas Taleb, is something one simply didnt anticipate, not just a rarity. Tenev wasnt a passive observer of the increasingly wild and risky behavior by novices over the past year. His firm and its imitators enabled them by making trading with borrowed money and derivatives free, easy, and even fun-a bit too much fun. Robinhoods whole business model prospered when its customers traded a lot, and it did even better because of their recklessness. Plenty of Robinhoods core demographic, young men, already are reckless without any encouragement. They also take their cues from one another-mainly on social media these days. Robinhoods interface and price point put that tendency on steroids. The reason Tenev was testifying that day was that his company had done too good of a job and had to hit the circuit breakers. Everything we know about the success or failure of individual investors tells us that this was a recipe for poor returns and high risk. So how did Robinhoods customers do? Tenev replied that they had collectively earned $35 billion over and above the money they had deposited. But how much had they deposited and what was their return? Would it be at least as good as just parking the money in an index fund? Tenev tellingly dodged the question, instead noting that his customers had more money than if they had just spent it instead. Gabriel Plotkin Details ISBN0593421159 Author Spencer Jakab Short Title The Revolution That Wasnt Pages 304 Language English Year 2022 ISBN-10 0593421159 ISBN-13 9780593421154 Format Hardcover Subtitle GameStop, Reddit, and the Fleecing of Small Investors Place of Publication New York Country of Publication United States Publication Date 2022-02-01 AU Release Date 2022-02-01 NZ Release Date 2022-02-01 US Release Date 2022-02-01 UK Release Date 2022-02-01 Publisher Penguin Putnam Inc Imprint Portfolio DEWEY 332.6322 Audience General Illustrations 8 Illustrations We've got this At The Nile, if you're looking for it, we've got it. With fast shipping, low prices, friendly service and well over a million items - you're bound to find what you want, at a price you'll love! 30 DAY RETURN POLICY No questions asked, 30 day returns! FREE DELIVERY No matter where you are in the UK, delivery is free. 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