Recap on House Committee of Financial Services Hearing

A few notable things about the hearing last afternoons five hour hearing. This hearing was brought together because of the stock Gamestock mid January that suddenly caught popularity beyond its start in Reddit's r/Wallstreetbets 

• It was way too long
• Five minutes for each representative to ask questions and get answers is way too short. 
• Pointing out the irony within the name Robinhood where this scenario brought restrictions of buying the stock GME during its peak, only selling. 
• Everyone seemed too old (average age of members of the house at the beginning of the 116 congress was 57.6 and senators was 62.9 years) There was a guide to understanding terminology used on the platform on Bloomberg and wow....

• Rep. Sean Caster calling Robinhood's help line to be immediately put on hold, after calling the number on the record.
• "Thank you for the question, great question, filibuster...dodging the question..."-Vlad
• "I like the stock" "I am not a cat" -Keith Gill
•  The discrepancy of all players in the conversation on Gamestop stock, Reddit CEO, Robinhoods CEO Vlad Tenev. Other players in this 5 hour conversation included Citadel Securities representative CEO Ken Griffin  and Melvin Capital's founder Gabriel Plotkin and u/deepfuckingvalue Keith Gill, a popular user of r/wallstreetbets who gained notoriety through his GME stock summary posts. 
• The difference in questioning by the house

Vlad Tenev, the chief executive of Robinhood, fielded the most questions during a House committee hearing on Thursday about the GameStop trading frenzy. https://t.co/94t59kteKq pic.twitter.com/v5UuNpCrlu

— The New York Times (@nytimes) February 18, 2021

 

• Citadel's Griffin being asked by Rep. Vargas how many people does he have next to him (assuming in terms of lawyers and publicists, the answer was 5) and others pointing out him reading from prompters throughout the hearing. Rep Vargas brought up how these corporations have enough help during this hearing compared to retail traders like Keith Gill.
• San Nicholas congratulates Keith Gill and other retail traders with the GME stock.
• Reddit's Steve Huffman talks about reddits r/wallstreetbets where people can come in and have a conversation about stock where other mainstreet platforms point out bad investment options and encourage their audience on TV radio, and magazines. 
• This is a list and link to those members who received political donations from Robinhood and Citidel, Here

• Representative pointing out the difference between consumers and products in this hearing, talking about how Robinhood was wrong about consumers, where the users are the products and the people beside him (Citidel and Melvin) are the consumers. 
• Connecticuts Jim Himes asks about rate of return compared to other investments than day trading being familiar with casinos in the area.
• Jennifer Schulp a former enforcement official for the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority did not definite Reddit's activity as stock market manipulation as defined as falsely deceptive behavior.