Meme Stocks: The Internet’s Stock-Picks for 2021 (GME, AMC, BB, CLOV, and more)

Alternative Title: 9 Ways to Put Your Money in a Trash Can and Set It On Fire

Which stocks are going up? Which stocks are going down? No one really knows, but read on to find out what people think is going to happen — or just jump to the “analysis.” (That term is used loosely.)

• GameStop (GME)
• AMC Theaters (AMC)
• BlackBerry (BB)
• Nokia (NOK)
• Clean Energy Fuels Group (CLNE)
• Clover Health Investments (CLOV)
• Clever Leaves Holdings, Inc. (CLVR)
• Sundial Growers, Inc (SNDL)
• Tilray, Inc (TLRY)
• Wendy’s (WEN)
• Wish (WISH)

First, a brief history lesson.

How the Internet Broke the Stock Market

It all started when internet traders noticed that GameStop (GME) was over-shorted. Large investment funds were “betting” that GameStop would continue to go down — so significantly that the stock itself was (in some opinions) artificially devalued. Online traders decided to purchase GME, at first because they “liked the stock,” and later as an F-you to the hedge funds pushing it down.

And it worked. GameStop went from trading at $4.01 in August 2020 to a peak of $347.51 in February 2021. If you’re bad at math, which most online traders are, that’s an increase of 8,666%. In fact, as of mid-2021, GME still stands at $248.36. Even after it crashed it still represents an increase of over 1,000%.

This was unprecedented. Almost an act of war. Not because the market was being manipulated, but because it was being manipulated by the “little guy.” These are trades and manipulations that hedge funds do all the time. But it underscored the power of the “retail investor” — the at-home trader.

So, they did it again with AMC. AMC went from $2.01 in January 2021 to $62.55 in June 2021. It’s a less surprising yield, but that makes sense — AMC wasn’t as over-shorted as GME.

What internet traders are proving, through a series of memes and shitposts, is that they have enough volume to affect the market. In fact, as of June 2021, retail traders own about 80 percent of AMC.

When does it end? How long does it last? No one knows, least of all the traders themselves. Half the traders on r/WSB are teenagers. Half of them are already millionaires. Half of them are psychopaths. The Venn diagram is about as clean as the average retail trader’s keyboard.

But you don’t have to be eating tendies in your wife’s boyfriend’s basement to start investing in the new movement. You just have to be, well, a little dumb with your money.

America’s New Lottery Ticket

Most people aren’t yoloing their entire savings account on AMC. They haven’t gone, what r/WSB calls, “Full R*tard.” (They’re charming people, aren’t they?)

But let’s do some back-of-the-hand math. If you invested $1,000 in AMC when it was $2 and cashed out at $60, you would have still made $30,000. That isn’t “retire early” money, but it is “put a downpayment on a Tesla so Muskdaddy can send you to Mars” money.

If you had invested $1,000 in GME when it was trading at $5 a share, you could have cashed out at $60,000 — even if you didn’t time it right. That’s, at minimum, enough insulin for six months!

And if you think we’re being a bit cavalier, there’s something you need to understand. The actions of r/WallStreetBets and — on a broader level — internet traders are ones of desperation and frustration. At this point, we all know that the deck is stacked against us. The world is rigged. People are yoloing their money because let’s face it.

It’s their last chance.

The people on r/WallStreetBets are more than aware that it’s a huge gamble. That’s why it’s r/WallStreetBets, not r/WallStreetIntelligentandRiskAverseTrading. It’s right in the main term: YOLO.

You only live once, why not just throw your money in a trash can and burn it?

As many people have won money, there are people who have lost money; that’s how it works. The hope is that most of the people losing money are big traders — the hedgies. But somewhere, the little guy is getting screwed, too. That’s just the reality of it. You hear about Dogecoin Millionaires; you don’t hear about the dude who lost everything to Cumcoin.

Never invest money in a meme stock that you can’t afford to lose.

But hey.

Most of us invested in a college degree that’s worthless now. How much did that cost you? $60,000? $120,000? That thing is never going to get you a return.

At least the stock market has the illusion of hope.

None of This is Investment Advice

Consider: By and large, rich people don’t write books. I mean, some of them do — they hire some long-suffering ghostwriter to write about their terrible past (they couldn’t even afford horse-riding lessons) or their terrible present (if only I wasn’t doing so much cocaine). But no rich person is going to tell you how to get rich. They don’t have the time. They are busy being rich.

I don’t know what’s happening in this market. No one does. I know what has happened in the market and, tentatively, why. I can tell you what decisions people are making and what theories they have behind those decisions, but no one can tell you whether they are right or wrong because from the very first time a caveman traded a pretty stone for a piece of meat it’s all been made up.

It’s all complete fiction. None of it means anything.

Things have worth because we assign them worth. If we want to say that a GIF of Tiger Woods’ balls is worth $18,000 — and someone is willing to pay that amount for it — then gosh darn it, it is. At this point, all the checks and balances have been thrown out the window, and (apart from some minor structural and fundamental hedges) value is what you can get other people to agree it is.

So — have fun, good luck, don’t die.

The Meme Stocks of 2021

First: What are the meme stocks? Primarily identified by the r/WallStreetBets subreddit, meme stocks are stocks that investors are “agreeing” are undervalued, fundamentally strong, or just shorted to death.

Most people know about GME, but the triumvirate of retail stocks has been GME, AMC, and BB from the start. Now that many are already holding GME, AMC, and BB (and fortunes have been made), retail investors are expanding into other stocks.

GameStop (GME)

52-week low: $3.77

52-week high: $483.00

Recent Growth: 1,339% (Y-T-D, June 2021)

As of June 2021, GME’s 52-week high is $483.00 and 52-week low is $3.77. On June 5, 2021 it sits at $248.36 and — it can’t be denied — it has been slowly edging its way upward again since its mid-February crash. r/WSB is still “HODL”ing GME. But is it still a good investment?

As most people understand, the stock market is supposed to be “supply and demand.” If more people want a stock, the price goes up. If people want to sell, the price goes down. At least, that’s how it’s supposed to work.

What complicates the situation is the fact that people can “buy and hold” futures. Hold on to your seat, because you’re going to suddenly understand what happened in the movie Trading Places.

Let’s say a hedge fund manager sees GME at $10 and thinks that it’s going to go down to $5. What he does is he writes out that he’s willing to buy GME at $5 later and he sells it at $10 now. The thing is, he has to buy it at $5 later. If he isn’t able to buy it at $5, he has to buy it at a higher price — because he has to sell it at $10.

The hedge fund manager can try to hold out. But if the price keeps going up and up, at some point they have to exit. At some point, they have to buy at a higher price. Some hedge fund managers may hold on, with the certainty that GME will crash again. Others will just cut their losses.

With GME, a lot of hedge funds had sold GME sure that GME was going to continue to go down. When it started going up, they were left holding the bag. For the most part, these short sellers have already exited the market. But the thing is that there are still investors who are short selling GME now — because they believe that the stock is artificially inflated due to retail investors.

An issue is that some firms are now blocking the trading of “meme stocks.” In June 2021, Jefferies Prime Brokerage announced that GME and AMC could no longer be short sold. Bank of America has stopped covering GME. And brokerages such as Robinhood have been notorious for limiting trading of GME when pressures get high.

Most of the positive fundamentals of GME is already priced in, such as the CEO leaving, and the founder of Chewy entering in. But it’s impossible to predict whether GME could continue to rise because of the interaction between retail investors, short sellers, and the hedge funds which do continue to trade in it.

AMC Theaters (AMC)

52-week low: $1.91

52-week high: $72.62

Recent Growth: 2,283% (Y-T-D, June 2021)

In some ways, AMC is fundamentally stronger than GameStop. At the beginning of January, AMC Theaters was in a perilous position; during the COVID-19 pandemic, most theaters were unable to operate. But with business restrictions being lifted, the movie theater industry is poised to experience a significant resurgence.

AMC experienced a 52-week low of $1.91 and a 52-week high of $72.62, as of June 2021. In June, it fell back to $47.91. But it may not be done. AMC itself is encouraging retail investors, offering them bonuses such as free popcorn. Presently, about 80 percent of AMC is reportedly held by these retail investors — an incredible amount.

But about 20 percent of AMC’s shares are still shorted, which means there’s still room for aggressive growth. In fact, short interest in AMC has gone up — in May, it went up by about 8 percent.

AMC has been part of the “meme stock” group for almost as long as GME. But it wasn’t the focus until fairly recently. GME, AMC, and BB holders form a sort of “devil’s triumvirate of jackassery” that is targeted squarely at the hedge funds and big investors artificially holding them down.

Unlike GME, which had previously been slowly sliding into market irrelevancy, there was very little argument that AMC was underpriced. The question now is what its true pricing could be. Because so many movie theaters folded during the pandemic, AMC could actually capitalize and consolidate on the newly lean market.

BlackBerry (BB)

52-week low: $4.37

52-week high: $28.77

Recent Growth: 110.64% (Y-T-D, June 2021)

No one’s bought a BlackBerry in years. You know that. I know that. The company knows that. Actually, apart from making phones that inexplicably still have physical keyboards, BlackBerry is pivoting into the digital security space.

And that’s pretty attractive for investors.

BlackBerry appears to be the “next” retail target after GME and AMC. And did you know that BlackBerry is a Canadian company? That’s not strictly relevant, that’s just something we didn’t know. We think it’s neat.

BlackBerry, unlike AMC and GME, is not heavily shorted, which makes it an interesting play. Short interest in BlackBerry is closer to 9 percent compared to the 20 percent that GME and AMC experience. But again, there’s a confounding factor — what happens as demand for BlackBerry rises and others short sell BlackBerry to compensate?

What we’ve seen is that throughout 2021, BlackBerry’s short interest has gone up. At the end of January, short interest in BlackBerry was about $300 million. As of May, it was closer to $400 million. These are statements, not market analysis. As we’ve established, market analysis is useless.

Nokia (NOK)

52-week low: $3.21

52-week high: $9.79

Recent Growth: 40.87% (Y-T-D, June 2021)

Like BlackBerry, Nokia stock was being touted as a potential investment in the early days of GME. You may have noticed that these stocks have a lot in common; they’re dinosaurs within disrupted space. Whether retail traders decided to pick these stocks up as “underdogs,” whether they have faith in these long-lasting companies to prevail, or whether they just think it’s hilarious, is up for debate.

NOK stock has been barely touched by the frenzy thus far. Yet, as of June 2021, it’s gone up by 40.87% YTD. Nokia is believed to be undervalued compared to its competition. Many actual analysts believe that it’s a solid stock. Short interest in Nokia is also going up: in May, it went up by 10%. Right now, it’s barely being discussed.

Traditional investors can feel encouraged that NOK holds up to market analysis. It’s a solid company, not, say, a brick-and-mortar game retailer trying to hold back the tide of time. NOK never, for instance, offered you a $6 trade-in credit for a $60 game. But because of that, it might not be dumb enough to succeed — unless it’s going to start giving out old Nokia phones to its retail investors in popcorn buckets.

Clean Energy Fuels Group (CLNE)

52-week low: $2.01

52-week high: $19.79

Recent Growth: 18.90% (Y-T-D, June 2021)

You’re right — what the hell is CLNE?

Most people had never heard of CLNE until it started to rise. It’s being touted as one of the successors of AMC/BB, but to be entirely honest, it could be astroturfing — there could be a company out there that’s intentionally promoting CLNE for their own ends.

Why? CLNE doesn’t share a lot in common with the other big picks. GME, AMC, BB, and NOK are all household names, which makes sense; retail investors are far more likely to purchase stocks when they know and understand the brands. CLNE is something that, well, to be honest, a “real” investor might look at.

And that’s a bit suspicious.

CLNE is a green stock; it’s focused on renewable natural gas. It suffered during COVID, but analysts believe that it could grow. It appears to be undervalued, but it’s not a great opportunity for a squeeze — it’s more or less a legitimate company that appears to be trading at far less than it’s worth. This stock isn’t going to make “GME millionaires,” but it might be a nice introduction to the world of “actual investing.”

Clover Health Investments (CLOV)

52-week low: $6.31

52-week high: $24.93

Recent Growth: 40.42% (Y-T-D, June 2021)

Just for a change, what about a stock that’s currently plummeting (WELL IT WAS, WHEN I WROTE THIS, ONE DAY AGO.)? Although, for those who are enamored with the regular “buy low, sell high” strategies, CLOV is about as low as it will get. CLOV is a healthcare technology company. In general, the words “healthcare” and “technology” married together should print money.

CLOV is currently heavily shorted, though not shorted as much as it was back in April. With CLOV heading downward so quickly, though, there is some argument that another short squeeze could be pulled off. As of June 2021, CLOV has a 36% short interest rate.

Out of many on this list, CLOV is one of the few that really could represent another short squeeze. To really pull off what investors pulled off with GME, the short interest component is a necessity — a lot of the retail trader stock picks are undervalued stocks rather than extremely shorted stocks.

But a challenge with CLOV is that, well, it may just not be worth a lot. As far as most analysts are concerned, CLOV isn’t even a hold — it’s a sell. It has been reporting poor earnings, is top-heavy, and has a lot of competition.

(Exactly a day after I wrote this, CLOV essentially doubled in price, which gives you an indication of the market forces at work.)

Clever Leaves Holdings, Inc. (CLVR)

52-week low: $7.96

52-week high: $19.46

Recent Growth: 3.01% (Y-T-D, June 2021)

Does anyone remember when r/WSBs yolo’d a bunch of their money into pot penny stocks and lost the bag because, frankly, the market is oversaturated and there aren’t any major players? Well, they don’t. CLVR is a pharmaceutical-grade weed stock — and, as of June 2021, it’s not doing that great. But that could turn around, if the retail traders are right.

Reddit was previously able to increase CLVR’s stock price by about 50 percent, which is not surprising since the entire market cap of CLVR is under $300 million. Analysts are fairly neutral on CLVR; it’s neither a buy nor a sell, but a “HOLD.” Short interest in CLVR has also been steadily going down.

The impetus to buy CLVR comes primarily from the idea that it is still undervalued. It’s not a squeeze — rather, retail traders truly believe that CLVR is going to be able to corner the market on weed. The premise is that CLVR is going for high-volume, low-quality weed, rather than trying to compete in higher-value markets.

But if we’re going to be frank, I’m also pretty sure a few people have invested in CLVR confusing it with CLOV.

Sundial Growers, Inc (SNDL)

52-week low: $0.14

52-week high: $3.96

Recent Growth: 98.18% (Y-T-D, June 2021)

SNDL is another pot stock. And it’s a cheap pot stock; it’s basically a penny stock. But SNDL is also shorted to hell and back, which does provide some opportunities for buyers interested in a squeeze; the current short interest is 15.44%. SNDL has dealt with a variety of setbacks (mostly due to poor management) which have theoretically been addressed.

Some believe SNDL is undervalued; it’s a company with $2 billion market cap trading at penny stock prices despite having no debt. But there are a lot of weed stocks out there and while there are people hyping SNDL up, it’s one of the quieter stocks being supported by retail investors.

Tilray, Inc (TLRY)

52-week low: $4.41

52-week high: $67.00

Recent Growth: 108.89% (Y-T-D, June 2021)

Another pharmaceuticals and cannabis company, Tilray, Inc is also believed to be undervalued. At this point, you might be wondering how much of the cannabis market could possibly be undervalued. This is a good thing to wonder about.

TLRY does have about 30 percent of the cannabis market share and it previously had a pretty big run. It’s one of the larger cannabis companies with a market cap of $8.41 billion. But, from an idiot’s perspective rather than a fundamental perspective, the cannabis plays appear to be a risk. For one, it doesn’t seem that anyone can agree on which cannabis stock to promote.

A primary issue is that investments, realistically, need to be about the stock. Investing simply because other people are investing is borderline collusion. GME, AMC, and BB all were legitimately undervalued stocks that were being pushed down because hedge fund managers sensed imminent failure.

With the cannabis plays, it’s hard to say whether these individual stocks are actually undervalued or whether the market is just overly saturated. And TLRY’s short interest is only about 7%.

That being said, TLRY is trading at about $20 as of June 2021 and it peaked at $60 — which indicates that, if nothing else, there’s room for growth.

Wendy’s (WEN)

52-week low: $18.86

52-week high: $29.46

Recent Growth: 32.57% (Y-T-D, June 2021)

Wendy’s is a weird play. Well, they all are. But I suspect WEN is actually FUD — a fake play meant to shake the confidence of investors (Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt). First, WEN isn’t undervalued. It’s been trading pretty consistently upward for a long time. Second, WEN actually hasn’t been talked about very much at all on any of the forums; it appears as though the Reddit-Wendy’s connection was drawn first, and then buzz started being generated after.

But that doesn’t make Wendy’s a bad buy. Wendy’s actually performs very well in general and has an annual dividend yield of 1.74%. It is probably overvalued right now, but it would not be out of place in a regular, normal portfolio.

ContextLogic, Inc (WISH)

52-week low: $7.52

52-week high: $32.85

Recent Growth: -39.19% (Y-T-D, June 2021)

If you buy things online, you’ve probably run into Wish. WISH is another interesting play because it is very far off its peak; it went up to $32.85 in February 2021 and has been falling ever since. But because of that, it’s also potentially undervalued; as of June 2021, you can purchase an $11 stock that could (you know, maybe) be worth $30. Maybe.

Like the other retailers, WISH is something that Redditors know, and Reddit tends to choose stocks that they have direct interactivity and engagement with. WISH’s IPO was somewhat of a failure, not the least of which because of dismal earnings reports. WISH is likely another short squeeze play.

If You Had Invested Like an Idiot…

As stupid as this all probably sounds, let’s take a look at raw numbers. Let’s say you had $10,000 in tendie money and invested it all in a single stock in January 2021. By June, you would have made:

GME (1,339%)

$133,900

AMC (2,283%)

$228,300

BB (110.64%)

$11,064

NOK (40.87%)

$4,087

CLNE (18.90%)

$1,890

CLOV (-42.34%)

$4,042

CLVR (3.01%)

$301

SNDL (98.18%)

$9,818

TLRY (108.89%)

$10,889

S&P (14.30%)

$1,430

These are the figures without exiting perfectly — these are the figures if you were still holding, even now. Notably, only a couple of these stock picks performed worse than the S&P.

But also, the S&P didn’t perform too badly, at all.

Where to Throw Your Money Away

To actually invest in meme stocks, you need an account that lets you buy and trade stocks individually. Retail investors can start now at:

• TD Ameritrade.
• E-Trade Bank.
• Fidelity Investments.
• Charles Schwab.

These banks all let you manage your own investments. But if you want to go full idiot, you can actually just invest through Cash App — you know, the same app you use when you want to split a pizza with your drunk friends.

Before GMC/AMC/BB, Robinhood was the vehicle of choice for many online traders. But Robinhood has a penchant for pulling the plug when trading gets fast. Other alternatives include Stockpile and WeBull.

For the love of God, don’t trade on margin, and don’t trade options. Trading options (buying and selling stock you don’t hold) and trading on margin (trading much, much more than you actually own) both increase volatility. Meme stocks are already inherently volatile.

So, Should You Invest in Meme Stocks?

The r/wallstreetbets catchphrase is essentially “Get money or $ROPE trying.” What is “$ROPE”? Well, it’s when you hang yourself because you lost all your money.

It cannot be emphasized enough that meme stocks are a huge gamble. It is a David vs. Goliath setup that is currently more ideological than financial. Ideally, the masses of retail investors should be able to overcome not only the hedge fund investors, but the market itself.

The problem, of course, is that the Powers That Be aren’t wild about this. Brokerages can simply refuse to allow trading and suffer virtually no penalty. More and more, it’s becoming obvious that the game is rigged; the house never loses.

In other words, the gamble is not just whether the market forces will react as predicted — the gamble is whether the banks and the big investors will simply decide to take their ball and go home with it if they are losing.

In this analogy, the “ball” is the global economy.

It’s not entirely unlikely that these stocks will rise. Many of them do appear to be somewhat undervalued. But that doesn’t mean that people should YOLO their entire savings into them. Nothing is a guarantee.

Before you start investing in meme stocks, ask yourself seriously: “Can I afford to lose this money?” Practice telling your spouse, parents, or children “Hey, I lost all our money today, but thankfully, AMC is going to give us some free popcorn next time we buy a $24 ticket at the theater.

How to Talk to Idiots (aka Where to Go From Here)

Much of the retail investing is being done on Reddit:

http://www.reddit.com/r/wallstreetbets

http://www.reddit.com/r/superstonk

Twitter is also highly active, but more difficult to glean actionable insights from, as it is the social media equivalent of infinite monkeys on infinite typewriters, forever.

Perhaps most importantly, because the Internet is affecting the stock market, whatever the Internet believes will happen has a likelihood of happening. “Right” and “wrong” have no meaning anymore, if a stock reaches the Front Page of Reddit it likely will see an increase because it has reached the Front Page of Reddit.

This self-confirming bias is interesting, potentially reality-breaking, and has to be kept in mind — to some extent fundamentals and analysis no longer matter because the very interest in the stock has become part of its valuation.

At the end of the day, meme stocks, cryptocurrencies, and NFTs have taught us one important thing: Nothing means anything, life is arbitrary, and we are all going to die. Well, perhaps not the last one, but it still is true.

Should you invest in meme stocks? Should you jump out of a plane? Should you scuba dive with sharks? Should you go back to your ex-husband, just for the kids? Should you finally tell your aunt that you took that 23-and-Me test, and you know that she’s your mother?

Only you know what’s right for you. It’s probably not meme stocks. But, if it is, your answer is somewhere in the prior pages.

Coming Soon

Luxury GIFs: Why NFTs Are Stupid and You Should Never Buy Them But Also They’re Making Other People Millions of Dollars Right Now for No Reason