The Dichotomy of Meme Stocks: RoboTaxis beat Short Sellers Every Day
| 3 min read | by Alex HoffmannWith WSB celebrity Roaringkitty supposedly coming back on X / Twitter last week, meme stocks have returned to the investment public's consciousness. There are two classes of meme stocks: the loud ones and the silent ones.
The most prominent examples of the loud ones are Tesla ($TSLA) and AMC ($AMC). They have flashy CEOs who love talking to investors. They pitch future products just around the corner, irrespective of how unrealistic and inconsequential those pitches are.
The most recent Tesla announcements about FSD, RoboTaxi, Optimus, and a new car lineup, which are all just around the corner, are perfect examples of this behavior. The same goes for AMC's constant reminder of how impressive its popcorn is and that the next few quarters have some great blockbusters coming up that will surely have people coming back into their cinemas.
They host long, extensive earnings calls. Their CEOs are very active on social media, and their social media followers eat up their announcements, continuously arguing how revolutionary the companies' products are.
You can check out some examples of these earnings calls on the MarvinLabs web app.
Unlike the loud ones, the silent ones do not talk to investors other than to complain about alleged short sellers. The most prominent examples are GameStop ($GME) and Trump Media & Technology ($DJT).
They don't host earnings calls. They have the most sparse filings, sharing only the bare essentials the regulator requires of them. In its most recent earnings filing, GameStop didn't even bother to provide an exact number for sales or expenses, preferring to report ranges for those numbers.
As the companies don't share anything, much of the discussion about them centers on the alleged behavior of short sellers who have somehow conspired against the company. Rather than improving the company's prospects with new, exciting products, investors speculate on the eventual emergence of the Mother of all Short Squeezes (MOASS).
As all people speculate on is some alleged market dislocations, it doesn't matter what the companies do, so it doesn't matter if GameStop trades at 1,000x P/E or DJT at 2,000x revenue.
If we are coming back to the age of meme stocks, let's at least focus on the meme stocks that care about their investors. We'd rather discuss and disagree about the prospects of Tesla's autopilot, RoboTaxi's, and AMC's popcorn than about supposed short sellers.
Alex is the co-founder and CEO of Marvin Labs. Prior to that, he spent five years in credit structuring and investments at Credit Suisse. He also spent six years as co-founder and CTO at TNX Logistics, which exited via a trade sale. In addition, Alex spent three years in special-situation investments at SIG-i Capital.