Yesterday, the US presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a well-known supporter of Bitcoin and the world of cryptocurrencies, decided to purchase 24,000 dollars worth of GameStop (GME) shares as a sign of support for US retail investors.
By doing so, it has added to the “meme-stocks mania” that has characterized the performance of the stock markets in recent weeks, after the famous “Roaring Kitty” triggered the pump of the GME price with just one tweet.
In the meantime, both BIden and Trump are trying to appear more open towards the crypto industry, in anticipation of the November elections.
All the details below.
Robert F. Kennedy supports the retail rebellion and buys GameStop (GME) shares
Yesterday, presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. publicly declared that he had purchased Gamestop (GME) shares at the stock exchange NYSE for a value of 24,000 dollars, effectively joining the frenzied moment of meme stocks.
It is not a substantial amount: Kennedy last year stated that he had purchased 2 Bitcoin for each of his 7 children and had financially exposed himself with the cryptocurrency for hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Il suo ordine di acquisto di azioni Gamestop (GME) sottende piuttosto delle motivazioni di natura politica e deriva dalla volontà di sostenere la cosiddetta “ribellione dei retail”, dopo che quest’ultimi hanno manifestato il proprio scontento per la poca trasparenza dei mercati finanziari statunitensi e per la forte componente manipolativa.
“My administration will support Ape’s retail rebellion and implement aggressive Wall Street reforms. To match action with words, I have just invested $24,000 in GameStop.”
I’m very aware of what the average retail investor has been saying about the need for greater transparency in our markets, stronger regulatory oversight and tougher penalties for market manipulation and criminal behavior. My administration will support the Ape retail rebellion… pic.twitter.com/pjDgeSUXcY
— Robert F. Kennedy Jr (@RobertKennedyJr) May 21, 2024
On May 13, user X “Roaring Kitty”, the same one who in 2021 had fueled the rush to buy Gamestop shares among small investors of the well-known Reddit group “WallStreetBets”, leading to margin calls for several hedge funds that had been shorting the stock for years, has returned to the scene, unleashing the meme-stock mania.
With an iconic tweet, featuring a subject sitting and playing video games who starts to pay more attention to something, it once again triggered an extreme pump of the same stock without explicitly mentioning it in any way.
This time, however, things did not go as well as in 2021: on that occasion, GameStop had grown by over 2000% in just 3 weeks, going from 4.5 dollars to a maximum of 120 dollars, while this time the pump was significantly more moderate.
In a week the bubble deflated quickly, first recording a growth of 180% and then closing at a loss, with several traders who got burned.
According to an analysis by Investor’s Business Daily on data from S&P Global Market Intelligence and MarketSurge, retail investors in the grip of FOMO have lost about 13 billion dollars from the peak of May 14, also victims of the fact that more than once trading sessions have been interrupted due to volatility, effectively halting the rally.
Probably, given the trend of the price action of the stock, even the presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy is at a loss on his GME position.
In any case, as mentioned earlier, Kennedy was only interested in showing solidarity with a group of small investors that is becoming increasingly compact and widespread.
Kennedy Jr. is indeed actively courting undecided voters with a fringe political brand that could appeal to some meme-stock investors.
For the moment, it seems to have garnered the media interest it was seeking, with its post on X reaching a record of 2.8 million views and several newspapers talking about its investment in GME.
US Presidential Elections: Biden and the candidates try to appear crypto-friendly during the election campaigns
After the success of Kennedy Jr.’s post, which attracted the attention of retail by announcing the purchase of GameStop (GME) shares, the counter-responses from the election campaigns of Biden and Trump have arrived.
The presidente democratico e il candidato repubblicano sono infatti passati all’azione cercando di ottenere il sostegno dei sempre più cittadini interessati al settore delle criptovalute.
Trump immediately announced that he had started accepting donations in crypto for his election campaign, embracing P2P digital payments and thus appearing as a supporter of the cryptographic movement in the United States.
In a note, his staff stated the following:
“Today’s announcement reflects President Trump’s commitment to an agenda that values freedom over socialist government control”.
JUST IN: Donald Trump’s presidential campaign officially accepts #Bitcoin and crypto. pic.twitter.com/ILmMnmUdJy
— Watcher.Guru (@WatcherGuru) May 21, 2024
On the other hand, Biden, even though the news has not been verified by the president himself (but by authoritative sources like Bloomberg), seems to have reversed his dissent towards digital currencies influencing the Securities and Exchange Commission towards an approval of the Ethereum spot ETF.
According to some rumors, in fact, Biden would have pressured Gary Gensler, directing him towards the approval of form 19b-4s of the applicants for the regulated investment instrument in ETH.
ETF Analyst Eric Balchunas and James Seyffarth would have even increased their estimates of the success of the event from the previous 25% to the current 75%.
Update: @JSeyff and I are increasing our odds of spot Ether ETF approval to 75% (up from 25%), hearing chatter this afternoon that SEC could be doing a 180 on this (increasingly political issue), so now everyone scrambling (like us everyone else assumed they’d be denied). See… https://t.co/gcxgYHz3om
— Eric Balchunas (@EricBalchunas) May 20, 2024
All this positive movement that we are seeing in terms of news on the crypto markets, as well as the positive trend of the stock market, could be subtly influenced by the Biden administration, which is trying to make as many “friends” as possible in view of the US presidential elections in November.
We will see in the coming days what the counter-response of Kennedy and Trump will be and how the Gamestop (GME) saga will end.