Meme stock mania is back.
Some heavily shorted stocks connected to well-known consumer brands or heavily debated themes have been surging.
Why?
And what does that tell us about this equity market as a whole?
I'm Allison Nathan and this is Goldman Sachs Exchanges.
Today I'm joined by John Marshall, head of derivatives research in Goldman Sachs research.
John, welcome back to Exchanges.
Thanks for having me.
So, John, we are suddenly seeing some very big moves in some unexpected stocks.
So give us the update.
What is going on?
Yes, we're seeing broadly volumes pick up, particularly in the options market.
And we can trace that back to small traders or retail traders that are increasing activity.
This has been happening over the last few weeks, but has really only come to light in the past.
few days really with the big up moves in select stocks.
And so when we talk about these stocks that are moving sharply, they're often called meme stocks.
But give us a definition of what that actually means.
How do you define a meme stock?
Well, meme stock,
I think of literally as stocks that the Internet is focused on and therefore retail traders become focused on.