The man who helped fuel the massive surge in GameStop shares is using his appearance before U.S. lawmakers Thursday to insist he’s just a regular guy who believes in the video-game company.
Keith Gill plans to say he isn’t a financial adviser, and he wasn’t part of any pump-and-dump scheme, according to testimony he provided U.S. lawmakers.
Instead, Roaring Kitty—the moniker he uses on his YouTube channel—said he is the son of a working-class family who for years struggled to get a decent paycheck, but then became a multimillionaire betting on GameStop Corp.
Gill, who also goes by DeepF-----gValue, said his investment in GameStop was entirely his own idea, based on publicly available information, and he didn’t call for anyone to buy or sell the shares for his profit. The U.S. House of Representatives hearing Thursday will look into last month’s surge in “meme” stocks.
“I do not have clients and I do not provide personalized investment advice for fees or commissions,” Gill said. “I did not belong to any groups trying to create movements in the stock price. I have never had a financial relationship with any hedge fund.”
Gill’s comments come as he was hit with a lawsuit that accused him of misrepresenting himself as an amateur investor. The suit alleges that he was actually a licensed securities professional who manipulated the market for profit. Gill had touted GameStop shares through an extensive social media presence on YouTube, Twitter and on Reddit’s WallStreetBets forum.
In his testimony, Gill painted a different picture of his professional background. He outlined a career that included a failed attempt to start an investment firm and with a salary that until 2016 never exceeded $40,000. He began analyzing stocks in 2017 when he was unemployed for two years before accepting a marketing and financial-education job at Mass Mutual, he said.
Two factors gave him the confidence in GameStop, Gill said: The market was overestimating the company’s likelihood of going bankrupt and underestimating its ability to reinvent itself.
Gill called the idea that he used social media to pump the GameStop stock “preposterous.” Instead, he said his decision to share his investment ideas online was driven by a desire to help others. He noted that he was “abundantly clear” that his channel was for educational purposes only and that his investing style may not be suitable for everyone.
“Hedge funds and other Wall Street firms have teams of analysts working together to compile research and critique investment ideas, while individual investors have not had that advantage,” Gill said. “Social media platforms like YouTube, Twitter, and WallStreetBets on Reddit are leveling the playing field. And in a year of quarantines and Covid, engaging with other investors on social media was a safe way to socialize. We had fun.”
Gill said that his final stream of 2020 topped out at 96 concurrent viewers and that on Christmas morning he had about 592 YouTube subscribers, and 550 followers on Twitter. On Dec. 24, GameStop shares were trading at about $20. By the end of January, they had soared to $325.
Even before that January surge, Gill had already made gains from his early investment in GameStop. In December, a month before the rally in Gamestop gripped markets, he was excited to visit his family in Brockton for the holidays to break the news: “We were millionaires,” he said.
“As for what I expect moving forward: GameStop’s stock price may have gotten a bit ahead of itself last month, but I’m as bullish as I’ve ever been on a potential turnaround,” Gill said. “In short, I like the stock. And what’s stunning is that, as far as I can tell, the market remains oblivious to GameStop’s unique opportunity within the gaming industry.”
This article was provided by Bloomberg News.