GameStop shares surge after Roaring Kitty posts bizarre cryptic message

The GameStop short squeeze of 2021 was one of the most chaotic moments in stock market history, and one recent social media post could suggest its all about to happen again.

The stock market by its very nature is volatile, as numbers go up and down every single day in reaction to current events.

Many of these are driven by the actions of companies or real-world events with significant impacts, but sometimes individuals can really make a difference.

Perhaps no greater impact has occurred before or since Keith "Roaring Kitty" Gill, otherwise known as 'DeepF***ingValue' on Reddit, invested heavily in GameStop stock in 2021, causing a tidal wave that eventually saw the price increase by 1600%.

Significant to this story was the effect of the surge, as it caused a massage negative impact on hedge funds who were 'shorting' the video game retailer's stock, as they had gambled on the price falling but it in fact rose dramatically.

Driven by posts from Roaring Kitty on the r/wallstreetbets subreddit, many individuals were convinced to buy into Gamestop stock as almost a collective action, and that is what drove the price to rise so significantly.

Things had gone relatively cold since that famous surge, which in-turn inspired the 2023 film Dumb Money, but following Gill's return to social media in May 2024, GameStop stock rise once again, although it shortly returned to normal levels.

However, a recent post on X (formerly Twitter) from the enigmatic figure has caused things to heat up again, as the cryptic message has left many to feel the community spirit that drove the original event once more.

Gill posted an imagine of a TIME magazine cover that is almost identical to one in 2006 that proclaimed the winner of their annual 'Person of the Year' award to be 'you'.

While the original cover had the words 'you' on the monitor screen, Gill has left it blank, perhaps insinuating that another target is on the way, or that it is simply a call to action for many.

Share prices peaked at $30.34 on December 5, and a one-month increase of around 25% has many excited again about the prospect of another GameStop push.

It remains unlikely, however, that we'll see the retailer's stock reach anywhere near the $81.25 heights of early 2021 again, but you can never say never, especially when social media is involved.

Many have drawn their attention to cryptocurrencies as a means of making money, as Bitcoin has recently reached the historic milestone of $100,000, but there's little that can match the rush that Roaring Kitty and his fellow users felt in the initial push.